Express Focus -- ASSAM -- by Indian Express

November 14, 2000

Bullets find a new target

SAMUDRA GUPTA KASHYAP looks at the recent spate of blood-letting in Assam, where militants have been selectively gunning down Hindi-speaking non-Assamese

Assam is back in the news for all the wrong reasons. The state was recently rocked by a series of killings committed by armed underground groups, with ultras selectively targeting non-Assamese settlers, mostly Hindi-speaking.
One of the earliest incidents was in Naohalia, near the oil township of Duliajan in Upper Assam where suspected ULFA rebels gunned down five innocents, including a child, on October 22. A day later militants struck in a village near the tea township of Doomdooma, also in Upper Assam, killing 11 persons.

And four days later, on October 26, in the heart of Nalbari town in Lower Assam, as many as ten persons were gunned down on Diwali day. In all these incidents, the majority of persons killed belonged to Hindi-speaking communities, mostly Bihari and Marwari settlers and all petty businessmen. On November eight, eight more persons were killed, this time in Barpeta district in Lower Assam with the police attributing the crime to the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB). In this incident too, three of the victims were Biharis and the rest migrant Muslims.

‘‘There is a definite pattern behind these killings,’’ says Assam Police Additional DG GMS Srivastava, in charge of operations against ULFA and Bodo groups, the Bodoland Liberation Tigers (BLT) and the NDFB.

Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta on his part claimed that “at least one political party is out to create trouble. After all, the elections are drawing close, and which opposition party would like to give credit to my government for bringing the state back on the rails?’’

It is a fact that the ULFA’s support base has eroded like never before, and it is also a fact that Assam’s economy has limped back to normal during the past three or four years. Agricultural production has gone up and the state has attained self-sufficiency in rice and fish seed.

There has not been any significant improvement on the industrial front, but several cigarette and cosmetic goods companies have set up shop in the state following excise duty exemption announced under provisions of the North East industrial policy. More and more ULFA cadres have surrendered, and the publicity machinery of the outfit has been considerably hit in recent months. Local newspapers have stopped giving the rebels the kind of splash they used to four or five years ago.

‘‘The ULFA is now trying to regain lost support among Assamese-speaking people by targeting the Hindi-speaking business community that has been long since identified with exploitation,’’ added Srivastava, the Additional DGP.

But even as lives are being lost, the ruling Asom Gana Parishad and opposition Congress are spending their energies accusing each other of having a nexus with ULFA militants. The exchange of words has been so bitter that when Mahanta recently stated in the Assembly that his government had documentary evidence of Congress leaders hobnobbing with the ULFA, state Congress president Tarun Gogoi threatened to sue Mahanta in return.

The Congress has also started demanding Central rule in the state, while the BJP, not yet a force to reckon in Assam, has stopped short of making such a demand. Even smaller groups like the Trinamool Gana Parishad and Asom Jatiya Sanmilani, both breakaway factions of the Asom Gana Parishad, have demanded dismissal of the Mahanta government.

In fact, political analysts see this targetting of the Hindi-speaking population as a way of making a case for imposition of Central rule.

But as militants continue to strike, there’s good news coming in from the countryside. Villagers have stopped providing shelter to militant youths. In the past year-and-a-half, there have been at least 30 incidents in which villagers have either beaten militants to death or handed them over to the security forces.

Readers can send feedback to
focus@expressindia.com