• Phanjoubam Tompok

Abstract: The Assam-Nagaland border dispute has been a protracted issue for almost sixty years and has involved more than twenty-five commissions, committees, and mediation processes, as well as a Supreme Court case pending for thirty-seven years, the dispute still has not resulted in any territorial settlement. This research analyzes the paradox of institutional failure in the Assam-Nagaland border dispute, where six decades of intentional institutional engagement—twenty-five plus commissions, committees, and mediation processes, along with thirty-seven years of a Supreme Court case—have resulted in no territorial settlement. Using a mixed-methods approach combining documentary analysis, institutional process tracing, and comparative strategic analysis, this research examines the rational instrumental interests of states and civil society organizations in continuing to prolong rather than settle the Assam-Nagaland border dispute. The analysis identifies three interconnected mechanisms that support the continuation of this prolongation: (1) Both governments in Assam and Nagaland use border disputes as a tool for obtaining electoral legitimacy and consolidating territory instead of using them as tools for settling the dispute; (2) The electoral incentives create a "managed contestation" in which electoral systems incentivize hardline positions on territory and penalize compromises; and (3) Rather than serving as independent peace-building organizations, civil society organizations are embedded in the state's instrumentalism through funding dependencies, organizational interests, and advocacy structures that support the idea of territorial indivisibility. Through analyzing how the use of territory as a negotiable strategic position transforms into an identity constitutive resource through legislative institutionalization and organizational advocacy, this research shows how the technical recommendations of committees become politically irrelevant when disputes transform into existence-based rather than technical issues. Based on instrumentalism, Monica Duffy Toft's territorial indivisibility framework, and electoral political economy, this research concludes that resolution of the dispute requires structural change that goes beyond institutional improvement including, but not limited to, electoral system reform, civil society organizational reform, and state leadership decisions that go beyond the electoral costs of prevailing institutionalized territorial maximalism. The results also demonstrate that the 240-fold increase in border infrastructure spending from ₹5 crore in the 1960s to ₹1,200 crore in 2024-25 is occurring directly as a result of the fact that the dispute has not yet been settled, allowing both states to justify continued expense as necessary security provisions rather than as part of a territorial consolidation strategy.

Territorial Indivisibility, electoral incentive structures, instrumentalism, Assam-Nagaland, interstate border dispute.

"Territorial indivisibility and electoral incentives: An instrumentalist analysis of Assam and Nagaland inter-state border dispute", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.13, Issue 1, page no.c342-c371, January-2026, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2601242.pdf

"Territorial indivisibility and electoral incentives: An instrumentalist analysis of Assam and Nagaland inter-state border dispute", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.13, Issue 1, page no. ppc342-c371, January-2026, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2601242.pdf