What does the future of India’s eastern corridor following the end of FMR?

On the edge of the Indo-Myanmar frontier, in villages like Behiang, Moreh, Zokhawthar, and Pangsa, the border is not an end but the middle. It cuts through ridgelines, rice fields, family trees, oral histories, and shared altars. For the Zo people—Mizos, Zomis and Chins, Nagas—the border has long been a geopolitical fiction tolerated only because of a practical arrangement: the Free Movement Regime. That fiction may be running out of breath.

In February 2024, India’s Ministry of Home Affairs declared the Free Movement Regime scrapped, citing “internal security” and “demographic integrity” in the Northeast. 

The decision came with little consultation with border communities and even less understanding of what the FMR meant on the ground​. It wasn’t merely a policy—it was oxygen for those living in the margins of the Indo-Myanmar borderland.

What followed was predictable and yet revealing. In Aizawl, members of the Zo Reunification Organisation (ZoRO) torched copies of government orders and denounced the decision as a betrayal of history. “You are asking us to get permission to enter our own house,” one speaker declared at a protest rally, referencing ancestral lands now requiring a permit to visit​. In Kohima, Nagas warned that the move would “divide people who have never accepted the border as legitimate.”

The Indian state, however, sees the matter differently. It frames the border not as a living space but as a line of leakage—of insurgents, drugs, migrants, and ideas. Since the 2021 military coup in Myanmar, the region has been awash with refugees, arms, and amphetamine tablets stamped with the signature “WY” logo, produced in the jungle labs of Shan and Sagaing​. The Manipur conflict, particularly the Meitei-Kuki-Zomi faultline, has brought these issues to a boil, with Meitei groups accusing the Centre of allowing demographic invasion through the border’s backdoor​.

In this context, the FMR was never going to survive. But scrapping it is no strategic masterstroke. It’s a policy driven by Delhi’s paranoia, not its wisdom.

A Cartographic Imposition

The Zo and Naga people did not draw the border that New Delhi now seeks to fence. It was drawn across them. Carved out through colonial cartography in 1826 and later formalized through treaties to which no local was a party, the Indo-Myanmar boundary sliced across highlands and histories with bureaucratic indifference. It left behind not two countries but one people living under two flags.

It divided the Chin Hills in Myanmar from the Lushai Hills in Mizoram, India. It bisected kinship networks that had survived empires and famines. “Our ancestors never crossed the border,” an elder in Champhai remarked at a recent rally. “The border crossed us.”

The Free Movement Regime (FMR) was a belated, if fragile, recognition of this truth. Introduced in 1970 and revived as part of India’s Act East policy, it allowed tribal communities to move within 16 kilometres of either side without documentation but with dignity. That dignity is now under siege.

In February 2024, the Indian government scrapped the FMR, citing national security concerns and demographic fears. What followed was not quiet acceptance, but coordinated resistance. In Kohima, on April 9, all twenty major Naga tribal organizations marched in unison against the fencing and the imposition of travel permits like the RAP and PAP. Their message was unambiguous: “For the Nagas living in the India-Myanmar borderland, the international border is just an imaginary line.” That wasn’t poetic hyperbole—it was a geopolitical fact​.

Nagas, Kukis, Mizos, and Chins have cultivated land, buried their dead, celebrated births, and exchanged goods across this invisible line for generations. The FMR wasn’t a loophole but an uneasy truce with history. Its removal, however, sends a message no one in the hills has missed: you now need permission to walk on the bones of your ancestors.

“Obtaining a border pass to move in our own land is unacceptable,” the Kohima protestors declared. “It is tantamount to taking permission to move around in one’s own house.”

In Mizoram, Chief Minister Lalduhoma initially stood with the people, voicing strong opposition to both the FMR rollback and the fencing plan. But by March 2024, the pressure from Delhi had mounted. With intelligence agencies branding Mizoram a “transit route” for illegal crossings and insurgents, Lalduhoma changed tack. His U-turn angered many, particularly among youth groups and civil society organizations, who saw it as a capitulation to central authority at the expense of cultural sovereignty​.

On the ground, nothing changed—except perhaps the sense of betrayal. What the Indian state frames as a matter of security, the communities see as erasure. The RAPs and PAPs are not safeguards. They are symbolic amputations, severing people from the lands and lives they’ve always known.

As one protestor in Kohima thundered: “The decision to fence was taken without asking the owner of the land.” The fence may rise, but the line’s legitimacy will remain contested, etched not on maps but in memory.

A Strategic Miscalculation?

In the rugged hills of India’s Northeast, where the borders blur and identities intertwine, New Delhi’s recent decision to fence the 1,643-kilometer frontier with Myanmar and dismantle the Free Movement Regime (FMR) is being met with skepticism and resistance. While the central government cites national security concerns ranging from insurgent infiltration to narcotics trafficking as justification, the move may inadvertently undermine India’s broader strategic objectives in the region.

The FMR, established in 1970 and revitalized in 2016 under the Act East Policy, was more than a border management tool—it was a recognition of the deep-rooted ethnic, cultural, and familial ties that span the India-Myanmar divide. Communities like the Nagas, Mizo, Zomis, and Chins have long navigated this porous border, their lives and livelihoods intricately linked across the arbitrary lines drawn during colonial times.

India risks alienating these communities by erecting physical barriers and imposing stringent movement restrictions. While aimed at curbing illegal activities, the fencing initiative may sever essential socio-economic connections, disrupt traditional trade routes, and erode the goodwill that has been painstakingly cultivated over decades.

Moreover, this hardline approach appears to contradict the ethos of the Act East Policy, which aspires to enhance connectivity and foster economic integration with Southeast Asia. The policy envisions the Northeast as a gateway to ASEAN markets, leveraging its geographical proximity and cultural affinities. However, the current securitization measures could stifle this vision, transforming the region from a bridge to a barricade.

The geopolitical implications are equally concerning. As India fortifies its eastern frontier, China continues to expand its influence in Myanmar through infrastructure projects and strategic partnerships. By focusing inward and adopting a defensive posture, India may cede ground to its regional rival, diminishing its leverage in the Indo-Pacific theatre.

Furthermore, the unilateral nature of these decisions has sparked unrest among local populations. Protests in Nagaland and Mizoram underscore a collective sentiment of marginalization, with Indigenous groups asserting that their voices have been excluded from critical policy deliberations. This technocratic, top-down approach undermines trust in governmental institutions and risks fueling separatist sentiments as communities feel alienated from the national narrative.

In essence, while the intent behind the fencing initiative may be to bolster national security, its execution could inadvertently destabilize the very regions it aims to protect. A more nuanced strategy—one that balances security imperatives with the socio-cultural realities of the borderlands—is imperative. Engaging local stakeholders, preserving traditional cross-border ties, and reinforcing the region’s role in India’s Act East Policy could offer a more sustainable path forward.

Borderland as Battleground

For decades, the Indo-Myanmar border was a twilight zone—undefined, ungoverned, and largely unacknowledged. Delhi preferred to look east through Myanmar rather than at the people living on the edge of its own map. But as instability deepens across the frontier, this strategic silence has given way to sudden, reactive assertion.

The removal of the Free Movement Regime (FMR) and the push for border fencing have less to do with development or connectivity and everything to do with what Indian security planners now call “territorial coherence.” Since the 2021 military coup in Myanmar, the region has become a pressure cooker. Thousands have fled across the border into India’s Northeast, many of whom are members of anti-junta militias or their families. The fear in Delhi isn’t just that arms and narcotics are flowing in—but that ideas are, too.

India’s northeast frontier states, particularly Manipur, Mizoram, and Nagaland, have long acted as informal sanctuaries for Chin, Kachin, and anti-Tatmadaw elements. In towns like Moreh, cross-border sympathies run deep. Villagers routinely provide food, shelter, and intelligence to resistance groups like the Chin National Front (CNF) and the People’s Defense Forces. For the Indian military and intelligence establishment, this has become a liability, especially as China increases its footprint in northern Myanmar through a cocktail of infrastructure, arms, and covert backing of junta-aligned militias​.

Security analysts point to the methamphetamine boom in Shan State, the porous jungle trails of Sagaing, and the post-coup proliferation of armed groups as justification for fencing. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime confirms that Myanmar is now Asia’s largest synthetic drug producer—a security threat that doesn’t respect maps​. In Delhi’s calculus, fencing the border is a preemptive strike against this deluge.

But here lies the contradiction. The very same India that pitches itself as a leader in regional connectivity through its Act East policy, Kaladan Multimodal Project, and the India-Myanmar-Thailand trilateral highway is now locking down the human arteries that sustain those ambitions. It wants commerce without contact and security without consent.

The northeastern borderlands, already marginalized, are being militarised under the guise of national interest. In Nagaland and Mizoram, the local governments have been reduced to spectators as central agencies dictate the frontier script. Once partners in dialogue, civil society voices are dismissed as “security risks.” This shift toward what Samir Kumar Das calls the “securitized state” has alienated the very populations India needs to secure its border​.

The fencing has already ignited protest fires. In Kohima, hundreds rallied against the imposition of surveillance regimes and border passes. In Aizawl, ZoRO burnt copies of the government orders, calling them “colonial leftovers repackaged as national policy”​. The resentment is no longer just against fencing but rather against the mindset it represents.

There is also a regional chessboard at play. While Delhi locks down the hills, Beijing is busy buying influence across the border. China’s infrastructure projects in Myanmar’s Chin and Kachin states—many of which were built with the cooperation of junta proxies—are less about roads and more about reach. If India alienates its own borderland communities, it opens a vacuum Beijing is more than willing to fill.

This border is no longer a line on a map but is becoming a theatre of insurgencies old and new. Of state versus sub-nationality. Of sovereignty versus survival. The withdrawal of the FMR and the aggressive fencing are not mere policy shifts but signals at play. Delhi is no longer willing to tolerate ambiguity. But in doing so, it risks replacing ambiguity with antagonism.

For decades, the Indo-Myanmar frontier was a seam—fragile, yes, but flexible. It could be stretched, mended, made to hold. Today, that seam is being pulled too tight. And when seams snap, they don’t tear evenly; they explode.

The Path Ahead

The Free Movement Regime (FMR) was never flawless. It had its loopholes and was occasionally misused. Yet, it stood a testament to a pragmatic understanding of the region’s intricate tapestry of ethnicities, histories, and geographies. Its abrupt removal doesn’t signify a strategic masterstroke but rather a miscalculation that may render the Northeast more fragile than fortified.

New Delhi faces a pivotal question: Will it govern the Northeast as an integral part of India or as a peripheral frontier to be managed? The people residing along the border have long perceived the FMR not merely as a policy but as an acknowledgement of their unique identity—a recognition of their intertwined histories, shared geographies, and collective humanity.

With fences rising and permits replacing traditional pathways, the message is clear: ancestral lands are being redefined as restricted zones. Yet, the resilience of these communities endures. As one protestor in Kohima aptly stated, “The decision to fence was taken without asking the owner of the land.”

Borders, much like narratives, cease to breathe when voices are silenced. But in the hills and valleys of the Northeast, the stories persist, echoing a collective memory that refuses to be fenced in.

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