Cong appeals for peace & harmony - Gogoi, activists to talk today - AICC secretary meets statehood crusaders

PCC president Bhubaneswar Kalita and AICC secretary in-charge of Assam Avinash Pande at
 Diphu in Karbi Anglong on Saturday. Picture by UB Photos

TT, Guwahati/ Diphu, Aug. 10: A wary Congress today stepped up efforts to douse the statehood fire sparked in Assam with the announcement of Telangana while those opposed to the state’s division urged Dispur to ensure development of all ethnic groups to check the clamour for separate states.

This was underlined by today’s whirlwind stock-taking visit by AICC secretary in charge of Assam Avinash Pande to Diphu, the Karbi Anglong district headquarters, where Pande urged the party’s rank and file to ensure peace at all cost. He also conveyed the party’s keenness to find a solution to the statehood demands through “dialogue and negotiations”.

Chief minister Tarun Gogoi followed suit with an invite in the afternoon to the Joint Action Committee for Autonomous State, comprising leaders of Karbi Anglong and Dima Hasao districts, for talks tomorrow before he leaves for Delhi to facilitate talks between Prime Minister Mammohan Singh and the agitating groups as announced by him on Wednesday. He will return on August 14. He had met Koch-Rajbongshi and Bodo groups earlier this week.

Though no untoward incident was reported this week, life remains affected in the twin hill districts and most of the lower Assam districts, which have been volatile since July 31 with Karbi, Dimasa, Bodo and Koch-Rajbongshi groups calling bandhs and blockades.

Statehood supporters carrying placards shouted slogans in support of their demand outside Rajiv Bhavan and the circuit house in Diphu today.

The protests continued to affect railway services. At least six trains, including the Rajdhani Express, ran late. “We are unable to normalise railway services because of continuous agitation and resultant security concerns,” NFR public relations officer Nripen Bhattacharya said.

Pande told The Telegraph after attending an extended executive meeting of the Karbi Anglong district Congress committee with PCC president Bhubaneswar Kalita in Diphu that he would convey the organisations’ statehood demands to AICC president Sonia Gandhi and would also visit BTAD in due course.

Restoring peace and harmony was the common refrain of both Pande and Kalita. “Besides the district Congress units, several other organisations have submitted memoranda to me. I will be making a PowerPoint presentation to our president. We will do everything to reach a solution through negotiations involving the chief minister, the PCC and the government. At the same time, we appeal to the organisations seeking states to ensure that their agitation is peaceful,” Pande said.

Echoing Pande, Kalita said party leaders have been asked to fan out to every nook and corner of the district to ensure peace and harmony.

Karbi Anglong DCC president S. Ronghang said they have submitted a two-page memorandum to the party president through Pande, seeking a separate state in the wake of the Telangana decision.

Other organisations like the HSDP also sought a separate state while the Karbi Anglong NC Hills Autonomous State Demand Committee demanded an autonomous state when these groups met Pande at the circuit house.

Assam Public Works, an NGO that moved the Supreme Court seeking update of the National Register of Citizens, today appealed to the state government to “seriously” analyse and redress the grievances of ethnic groups to stem the growing demand for states.

“We are not in favour of further division of the state but we want the ethnic group leaders to be in influential positions. We want to see Hagrama Mohilary as chief minister and take steps to address the grievances of the community he belongs to. The demand for a separate state suggests these groups are not happy with our government’s attitude towards their problems,” the NGO’s adviser Abhijit Sarma said here today.

AICC secretary Bhupen Kumar Borah had made similar observations last week. Similar suggestions have also been made by the KMSS and AASU.

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY DEVINSON TERON