Tags:
Journalism of Courage
This is completely and totally unacceptable. Reports are pouring in about attacks on Biharis and Kukis in Assam as organisations 8212; including terror outfits like the Ulfa 8212; go on a rampage with some tacit ground support and intellectual justification from political parties like the Aasu. This party now smells in the air an opportunity to isolate and attack the Tarun Gogoi government and ingratiate itself with the more extreme elements in Assam by raising the outsider bogey of yore. The exigencies of power politics aside, surely any mature politician in Assam today 8212; no matter his/her political affiliation or ethnic sympathies 8212; should perceive this as a time to unitedly bring tensions down, not work assiduously toward adding even more fuel to the conflagration.
As for the Assam chief minister, Tarun Gogoi, he clearly did not read the gravity of the situation quickly enough. He should have, in fact, swung to the task of securing peace in his state the moment news of attacks on Northeastern travellers in trains passing through Bihar reached him late last week. Then again, when the first incidents of attacks on Biharis in his state began to surface he pretended to the world 8212; and possibly himself 8212;that things were under control and that his police were doing a fine job of securing life and property. This, as it turned out, was fantasy. Today, five days later, the situation is steadily deteriorating as any hopes of peace rapidly recede. Meanwhile, Chief Minister Rabri Devi in Bihar had better take her cue from Gogoi8217;s failures and ensure, through stern pre-emptive means, that violence does not resurface in her state as a reaction to the incidents in the neighbouring states. In other words, this is a time when Assam and Bihar governments must work in tandem, not at cross-purposes.
