Insurgencies in India: Myths vs. Truth

They don’t make global headlines. They rarely trend on social media. But the insurgencies simmering inside India aren’t gone. They’ve just been pushed to the edge of the nation’s mental map.

The Myth of Internal Peace

When the Indian government speaks of national security, it often talks like a surgeon who has already closed the wound. The Naxalite movement, it claims, is in its “last stage.” Kashmir, they insist, is now peaceful after the abrogation of Article 370. The Northeast? Integrated, developing, and voting. On the surface, it’s a tidy narrative of triumph: insurgencies contained, militants killed, normalcy restored.

But scratch beneath the surface, and you’ll find embers. Some are still glowing. Some are quietly flaring back to life.

As of 2025, India is grappling with at least four major ongoing insurgencies, each shaped by distinct historical, ethnic, and political roots:

1. Kashmir (Jammu & Kashmir)
2. The Naxalite-Maoist insurgency (Central and Eastern India)
3. Manipur and Nagaland (Northeast India)
4. Punjab separatist undercurrents (Sporadic, but resurgent)

There are other localized tensions-tribal discontent in Jharkhand, anti-dam agitations in Assam…