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After carnage,Assam acid test
What had happened on December 23, 2014 in the Kokrajhar Dwaipayan district as well as many other parts of Sonitpur district of Assam was something that was doubtless horrendous, barbaric and senseless. So much so that even a sane person can never possibly imagine in his wildest derm that such a horrid, traumatic form of terrorism could have occurred! But it had happened sending shivers down almost everyone’s spine. On that day the carnage by the NDFB(S) left more than 70 unarmed persons dead and many more wounded, besides rendering thousands homeless.
This macabre killing of the Adivasis by the terrorist group was, it will not be exaggeration, essentially a war waged against humanity as has been in a Peshawar Army school where the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP)
on December 16 last carried out the most barbaric and gruesome massacre of over 130 school children to avenge the Army’s six month-old what was called “Zarb-e-Azb”, which should be vehemently condemned by all in civil society.
What, however, is the most frustrating part of the macabre massacre was the Machiavellian manner in which the barbaric act was done by the cadres of the militant outfit that itself is a broad hint at how well were they trained in the use of sophisticated weapons before lending their hidden disbolic agenda to this logical conclusion. Equally frustrating was also the arson that followed the carnage. This rendered thousands of people homeless. The whole lot of affected people did not stay on; they fled safer places apprehending recurrence of violence. According to a latest report, around three lakh villagers were taking refuge in as many as 139 relief camps as against 81 camps set up soon after the December 23 and 24 terrorist attack when they were about one lakh in number, spread over four districts of the state, Kokrajhar, Chirang, Sonitpur and Vdalguri.
One gratifying aspects to the whole story, however, is that many civil society groups and some local TV channels are still doing what they can in this grave hour of crisis to reach out to these unfortunate people by dishing out goodliness such as blankets, garments, mosquito nets, shirts, pants, shares to rescue them from shivering cold, particularly as nights.
The key question that is now on everyone’s lips is: how long will they lead their camp life? The very question arises in a curious mind in threat if they have to overstay there, it is to be ensured by the administration that they are given basic amenities such as hygienic food, pure drinking water etc. Besides all these, they should also be given sufficient warm cloths to survive the winter nights. Are all these items made easily available to them?
One gratifying aspects to the whole story, however, is that many civil society groups and some local TV channels are still doing what they can in this grave hour of crisis to reach out to these unfortunate people by dishing out goodliness such as blankets, garments, mosquito nets, shirts, pants, shares to rescue them from shivering cold, particularly as nights.
There has arise a controversy over why the dreaded NDFB(S) suddenly went berserk and killed so many innocent villagers in several parts of the BTC area as also other regions of Assam letting loose a reign of terror. Should we care and delve into the circumstances leading to their killing, it will be clear to us that one major trigger for the terrorist outfit’s waging war against humanity was the beneath the surface reason: its leadership’s anger with the recent security forces’ reported killing of the outfit’s ten cadres. Soon after the security forces’ cracking down on them, its supreme Ingti Kathar Songbijit who is not a Bodo but a Karbi announced that he would retaliate by taking 10 lives of men in uniform for every NDFB(S) operative killed. Since he knows it well at heart that he clearly cannot do what they did, he ultimately did give his feelings in a what is called, “violent outburst” when he and his outfit took lives of as many as 78 innocent and unarmed villagers on that bloody Tuesday.
It was, to put the record straight, a Talibani act of the NDFB(S) which must be dealt with an iron hand. What must have upset one is that when it was already known that this group was hatching a conspiracy to kill people in revenge for the killing of each of their cadres, why did the security forces fail to take the offensive against its cadres or prevent the massacre? When a report suggests, through the state government by a Central intelligence agency, there was no reason at all for their failure because they were very much active in the weeks before the carnage and had been on the lookout for, its cadres. Or, did the inputs reach the administrations at a time when it was too late for them to give necessary instructions to the security forces? But then, the nature and timing of the massacre seem to hint to the point that a silly mistake by the state administration to coordinate the operation in time or a communication gap between the security forces and the administration could have led to such a grime situation.
Whatever may be, the fact of the matter is that had there been immediate and stern measures, the horrific killing could have been put at check, if not completely stopped. But why did the state government not react promptly when the incident was in the offing and, more importantly, when it was alerted about it, is a big surprise. No caring society can give license to the kind of massacre indulged in by the NDFB(S) that we had experienced on December 23. But it had come about because of its do or die attitude stemming from the Rajiv Gandhi government’s playing what is called, “an indulgent big brother”.
If Bodo militancy is today at its apogee, the reason lies in how Bodo militants have come to the position they are now in. In other words, there was political reason behind their growing menace. And, interestingly, the AGP chief Prafulla Kumar Mahanta blamed their acts of violence on the dishonest activities of the then Congress-led Central government. To speak broadly, he in a recently-held party symposium was of the view that in the second half of the 1980s, when the AGP came to power in Assam, the Central allegedly encouraged the Bodos to demand Statehood in order to destabilize the state government. What is even more frustrating is that they were even imparted military training by the personnel of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) in order to sap and topple an youthful and callow first –ever-regional party government. It is to be noted here that in 1995 when the Congress government was in the saddle in New Delhi under the stewardship of P.V.Narasimha Rao, it allegedly did try to commit one such malicious act to overthrow the Jyoti Basu-led united front government in West Bengal. This came into sharp focus following a startling revelation of the Puralia arms dropping incident the Central government allegedly wanted to be used by their henchmen for the purpose. But fortunately for the Front establishment, the efforts turned out to be a futile exercise. Thus all this suggests that the Congress was an expert in the art of manipulative politics. Resultantly, the decades-old party is gradually becoming the shadow of its former self.
What is really very sad is that in spite of the BTC and other parts of Assam turning into the killing field of the NDFB(S) for the past few years, both the state government and the BTC authorities could not achieve any substantial achievement in curbing the violence inspite of their best efforts. One encouraging development in the otherwise gloomy political situation, however, is that the combing operation launched by the security forces close on the heels of the NDFB(S) terrorists whish has yielded desired results with a number of hardcore of its members being nabbed. The operation should be time bound or the main purpose will be defeated. On the other hand, it is to be ensured that the group is never engaged in any dialogue. The NIA has rightlay been given the task to probe angles of conspiracy and the reported involvement of a third party in the carnage. It is also to be seen that the refugees in the camps lived in a hygienic condition with all basic amenities made available.
