Voice of Assam: The nuances

In the wake of unlawful and extreme expressions of dissent being portrayed in several locations of India against the CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) and NRC (National Register of Citizens), the origin of such unrests is many a time forgotten or overlooked. Assam, a progressive bordering state in the north-eastern part of India, has been the centre-point of such protests in the initial phase which caught many eyeballs around the country. It won’t be wrong to state that the rest of India (mostly the political parties, a few self-styled activists and PR-savvy individuals) simply hijacked the Assam protests and tried to give it a communal hue, thereby inciting further violence across the nation. Following this, owing to the ‘tyranny of distance’ (in the words of Rajdeep Sardesai) from the ‘Hindi Heartland’, the actual concerns of Assam have yet again failed to catch the headlines of national media (atleast to the extent that they should have). Thus, as someone born and brought up in this beautiful state, I feel it is needed to flag the subtle differences between the mostly peaceful protests in Assam and their oft-violent counterparts in the rest of India.

Because of its close proximity with Bangladesh in several locations (including my home town of Karimganj, which shares an international road border and a water border with Bangladesh), the problem of illegal migration has certainly plagued the state and it has, in many cases, changed the demography of several parliamentary/assembly constituencies. The adoption of ‘Assam Accord’ in 1985 was the culmination of a six-year long agitation led by the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), which meant that all the illegal foreigners (predominantly Bangladeshi Muslims) would be identified and deported to their home lands. This, in many ways, necessitated the need for a National Register of Citizens (NRC) to be implemented especially in Assam to safeguard the Assamese culture, traditions, heritage and language. It is important to note here that ‘Assamese’ broadly meant people speaking Assamese language and not the inhabitants of Assam as a whole. Naturally, when the Supreme Court monitored NRC was implemented a year ago in my state, there were no such protests happening anywhere as Assamese people were longing for this measure to be taken since many years. Even after it was found that there were many surprising omissions from the list, we haven’t seen any kind of violence in the streets of Assam. Therefore, Assamese people have never been broadly seen as dissenters against the concept of NRC and are certainly not part of the “Kagaz nahi dikhayenge” or “Desh maange azaadi, Kashmir maange azaadi” gangs.

Let us now try to understand the reasons behind the initial protests in Assam against the CAA. Since CAA is a means to provide citizenship to the religiously persecuted minority refugees from Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan who came to India before 2015, it would mean that many of the illegal migrants in Assam would now get all the governmental benefits and hence might eat into the employment opportunities of the local Assamese people. Moreover, since most of such illegal migrants (Hindu or Muslim) speak Bengali, they claim to be a threat to the so-called “indigenous” culture of Assam. Therefore, Assamese people in the Brahmaputra Valley took to the streets to raise their concerns against the legalization of such refugees in the Citizenship register. The protests, barring a few in the beginning, have mostly remained non-violent and it presents a fantastic example to the rest of India as to how to make your voices heard without causing mayhem to the public property. On the other hand, there have also been numerous huge rallies in support of CAA in Assam and often those have been neglected in the National Media because of obvious reasons. In any case, I feel that the CAA-driven new citizens of India should be settled in different parts of India and Assam should not bear the brunt of this action single-handedly. All in all, the protests in Assam have largely been on the cultural, linguistic and economic lines rather than on the “evergreen” communal vs secular lines.

However, Assam is a complex state where the dominance of different languages and tribes in different regions makes it a truly unique case of ‘coexistence in harmony’. The contrast to the broadly Assamese dominated areas of Brahmaputra valley is the Bengali heartland of Barak Valley and as such, the culture, the language and the ways of perceiving matters are vastly different in the two valleys. Of course, people there are also against the illegal migration from neighbouring countries but the ways of expressions are not exactly the same as those in the rest of Assam. Just as Assamese people are proud of their traditions and hence oppose the invasion or dominance of any non-Assamese sections in the state, Bengali people in Barak Valley also identify very closely with the “Bhasha Shahid Andolon” of 1961. This movement saw the death of 11 bravehearts who tirelessly fought against the Assam government against the forceful imposition of ‘Assamese’ as the only official language of Assam. Even after that, successive governments had imparted step-motherly treatment towards Barak Valley and hence there could never be a truly pan-state integration on a single issue. Besides, in the guise of ongoing protests, I have seen many Assamese chauvinistic radicals going upto the extent of saying “Bongali kheda” (Get Bengalis out) or “Bongal kheda”, when it clearly had to be “Bangladeshi kheda” (Get Bangladeshis out). The message should be loud and clear, all the Bengalis are not illegal migrants from Bangladesh and hence there should be an end to the sloganeering of blanket ban on Bengalis in Assam. Having said all these, I don’t blame the common masses on the two sides for this inherent rift as much as I blame the nasty politicians. Only when we begin to accept the differences and take everyone along, the ‘Voice of Assam’ would be stronger, louder and more reasonable.

Finally, it is worthwhile to look into the political aspect of the entire story with regards to Assam. Assam had been a long standing Congress citadel (with occasional stints of “Axom Gana Parishad”) only until 4 years ago and therefore the influx of illegal Bangladeshis (for whatever reasons) started long ago during the years those parties ruled the state. Therefore, unlike the other states of India, the opposition parties have not been able to gain political traction in the state by speaking against CAA/NRC and this has also been one of the striking differences from the Indian mainland. Assamese people have certain arguments against CAA and as a responsible government, the BJP leadership in the state and the centre must engage more with the local public and ensure there is effective redressal of all possible misgivings arising out of the noise of propaganda across the country. I feel that BJP leaders from the Assamese community have themselves not been dedicated enough in their stand and therefore, they could not communicate well with the electorate before implementing CAA. BJP should never forget that the key to their “North-East dream” is Assam and therefore they cannot ignore the voices of the Assamese community. The aggressive push from the BJP towards the development of the state will all get nullified in the minds of the voters if it comes to saving their own identities. Therefore, as the CAA comes into practice, it is now for the BJP to practice what they preach: “ Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas”.

~Krish, 18.01.2020