Asom: The Unfinished Agenda of Partition I THE REALITY MIRROR Bikash Sarmah I n no democratic system of the world would a federal unit be so condemned as countrys hinterland as Asom is, at the moment. This, despite the fact of commonality between this hinterland and so-called mainland India. The Government of Indias pretence is that the kind of durable disorder that Asom is witness to as argued by eminent political scientist Sanjib Barua in Durable Disorder has solutions intrinsically related to the problems of the region, and therefore the government could afford to be not only a silent spectator but also at a safe distance from the complexities of the region. Call it the fusion of geo-strategic equations with the Talibanic variety of pan-Islamism stemming from neighbouring Bangladesh, or the fallout of the derailment and hijacking of the ULFAs freedom struggle, Asoms is a unique case of a people being sacrificed at the altar of absolutist designs. By a people I mean the Asomiyas in the broader sense of the term, with the condition that the Asomiya so defined is obviously the one who has spontaneously identified himself with the Asomiya way of life. And there is no reason why this Asomiya way of life should not be regarded as a way of life, perhaps even beyond the existing ivory-tower definitions of nationality and subnationality. The fact, however, is that there is a clear impression that the Asomiyas should now cease to be an identity, let alone cherish a way of life; after all, Asom would no longer be their living space. My intention in producing the unfinished agenda of Partition vis-a-vis Asom has its basis on a very recent development which The Sentinel has reported exclusively this week. On June 4, talking to The Sentinel, Asom United Democratic Front (AUDF) MLA from Dhubri, Rashul Haq Bahadur, made it categorical that time was ripe for a demand for an autonomous council for the minorities in Asom; the so-called minorities being not only Muslims but also the linguistic minorities in the State. Mr Rashul Haq, after being fired a volley of questions, ultimately did manage to be at his confident best after a good deal of initial hesitation: that yes, absolutely, the linguistic minorities would definitely back him up in his demand for an autonomous council for the minorities. But the demand was in his personal capacity, he said. On June 5, AUDF working president Hafiz Rashid Choudhury told The Sentinel that the demand for an autonomous council for the minorities as raised by the AUDF MLA from Dhubri, was not in the agenda of his party, but then there was need for some sort of an introspection as to why such demands and tendencies were surfacing in the State. The Sentinel (June 6, 2007) editorial Minorities, but Who? rightly asked: How many illegal Bangladeshis can be excluded from such an autonomous council as proposed by a legislator of Asom who, mind you, belongs to a party that came into being just after the repeal of the IM(DT) Act a perverse immigration law, unique to secular India, that was thrust on the people of Asom, and only Asom, to make room for scores of illegal Bangladeshis to come and permanently settle in the State? It went on to add: That the AUDF MLA from Dhubri should have the guts to assert his voice through the media for an autonomous council for the minorities, in a masterly stroke of secular genius so as to also include linguistic groups that have nothing to do with that inglorious exclusivist theory, is nothing but a pointer to the days ahead of us. When the definition of minorities is distorted in Asom, it serves the cause of illegal Bangladeshis (in Asom). There may be many who would ask: What is so unsettling about one particular AUDF MLA talking of an autonomous council for the minorities, whoever these minorities be? The AUDF has already made it clear that such a demand is not in the agenda of the party. So just dismiss the whole episode as something bygone or as maverick indulgence by a politician posing as the saviour of the minorities in Asom just to create a bit of sensation. I have in mind the class of citizens in Asom and the country who would say so, and who would even rubbish the whole episode as paranoid reaction by a breed of Asomiyas not confident of sustaining themselves in their own right. To them all of whom are wonderful practitioners of secular fundamentalism that secular India is infamous for the only advice should be that they try to look beyond the immediate so that they discover and realize the imminent. It is not a question of one particular AUDF MLA seeking to effect a change in the minorities discourse in Asom. It is not even a question of one particular political party the AUDF having to accommodate an MLA who was so categorical about, what can indeed be called, an anti-Asom autonomy design. So much so, it is not even a question of reaching out giving pluralist Asom its due credit, as the MLA in question would perhaps explain to the diverse fringe groups in the State in order to consolidate as a voice of assertion against the injustices of the day. What is it really, then? It is a question of the mindset of a class of people in Asom, evolving anew yet again, after having seen, and seen through, the twists and turns of Asoms political course right from the time when the All Assam Students Union (AASU) launched a fiery six-year-long anti-foreigners agitation only to reinvent itself as a political force, the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), that ultimately wished away the very cause of that agitation. It is a question of a realization, then: that if the very sons of the soil can betray the soil, it will not be any betrayal if others do so. It is a question of confidence as well: that if a political party the AUDF that emerged out of the post-IM(DT) Act vacuum in Asom and that could not be prevented from staging a remarkable show in the Assembly elections of 2006 despite its public bemoaning of the repeal of the IM(DT) Act, has had such appeal as to even charm the AGP (remember the political arithmetic centred around the last Assembly elections when the AGP and the AUDF were warming up to each other?), there cannot be any fetters around any of the AUDFs legislators when it comes to extending the limits of political brinkmanship in the State; in fact, there is no such limit in todays Asom that is being gradually annexed by the illegal hordes from Bangladesh, IM(DT) Act or no IM(DT) Act, who continue to be the prized political assets in the State. This fact of annexation of Asom is not just about reducing the Asomiyas to a minority in their own homeland, but is more about the unfolding of the unfinished agenda of Partition that the Government of India and the metropolitan media are yet to realize. Next week, I shall begin by harping on the faultlines of Asoms indigenous assertions subnationalist, nationalist, armed, democratic, fringe and occasional only to drive home the point that the unfinished agenda of Partition in Asom has had its basis on those aberrations as well, apart from the most visible and proven one the ULFAs revolution. We shall discover how the Asomiyas have allowed themselves to be defiled. (The writer is the Consulting Editor of The Sentinel)
