New Delhi: Top NSCN-IM leader Thuingaleng Muivah arrived in New Delhi on Wednesday night to a rousing welcome from Naga students to take forward the peace process in Nagaland.
Nagas took over the Indira Gandhi International Airport to receive Muivah who is on his second visit to India in 39 years.
Muivah is likely to hold parleys with Central leaders during his visit to the country.
Muivah said: “We are only asking for our rights. We are only asking for what is ours. If despite our best effort there is no solution then we will live for the truth.”
NSCN-IM chairman Isak Chisi Swu is expected to join him in the first week of January.
Over 20 busloads of people descended at the airport and waited through the chilly, foggy night to greet Muivah and hear from their leader the exact purpose of his sudden India visit.
"We have come here to hear our beloved leader. We expect him to explain the purpose of his sudden and unplanned visit to India. The chill doesn't matter at this moment," the president of Naga Students Union of Delhi said.
There was strong police deployment at the arrival area of the international airport even as the people coming to receive Muivah, including a strong contingent of Delhi's print and television media, crowded the premises just before midnight.
A Naga student estimated the total number of Naga people waiting to receive Muivah to be close to 1,000. There were students and Naga citizens and seven NSCN-IM leaders who arrived in Delhi from Nagaland two days back to prepare the ground for Muivah's arrival.
Most of the students belonged to the Naga Students Union of Delhi and the Eastern India Naga Students' Association.
Muivah flew in straight from Amsterdam. Muivah is in Delhi on an invitation from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. It's likely to be a month-long trip for the top NSCN leader, during which he is also scheduled to visit Nagaland to interact with community leaders and various forums.
"The two leaders are on a political mission. They will hold direct talks with the PM," NSCN-IM leaders from Nagaland said here.
While the urgency in the direct talks may also signal some kind of a crisis in the peace talks front requiring urgent intervention by the PM, both sides here are talking of only 'forward movement' and there is hardly any sign of panic at the government level.
The exact itinerary of Muivah is not yet out. Neither has any date been fixed for Muivah's meeting with the PM or other ministers of his Cabinet.
NSCN representatives or Government sources here could not say if Muivah may visit the Gandhi Samadhi here like he did the last time.
This is the second time in 39 years that the NSCN-IM would be holding peace talks on Indian soil.
In 2004, Muivah and Swu held talks with former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in New Delhi.
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