Nalbari — when gun-shots silenced the fun that was diwali

"It went on hardly for half a minute or so. And as many as 15 persons had already been shot. They included both Umang as well as Saurabh," recalled Sanjay.

Luckily both the children have survived. But altogether nine persons have already died of the injuries, four of them on the spot. Umang and Saurabh are battling with life in a private hospital in Guwahati, 80 kms from here.

It happened last evening, at around 6:15 pm. "We were sitting in the verandah of our shop, while the kids and the young boys and girls were bursting crackers. We did not even have the time to run away," said Sandeep Chamariya.

Lakshminarayan Bajaj (75), owner of Nalbari Cycle Store died on the spot. So did his nephew Viswanath Bajaj, owner of Shyam Stores, who was also gossiping with his uncle. Godavari Devi, the mother of Sanjay, who had just rushed out on hearing the people shout, also received two shots on her chest and collapsed.

Across the road, Sawarmal Sharma, owner of Assam Road Links, was also killed on the spot. One of his employees, Naba Das, who received a shot on his stomach, tried to run away, only to fall dead in the verandah of the adjoining shop Sujata Stores.

"I saw the armed youths get into the vehicle almost immediately after they fired for about 30 seconds. But we heard the gunshots again, about 100 metres ahead, only to later find out that two more shopkeepers, Dharamchand Jain and Jai Kumar Jain have been also killed," said Swapan Nath, an employee of Sujata Stores, who had a narrow escape.

The entire town of Nalbari is still in a state of shock even after 16 hours of the incident, when chief minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta arrived here. There is a spontaneous bandh in the town, where the last time the ULFA had struck in a big way was on February 27, when they had blown off the vehicle of local MLA and state PWD minister Nagen Sharma.

"The ULFA is getting desperate," said chief minister Mahanta, who visited the houses of all the nine persons who were killed here last evening. "They know that their mass support among the Assamese people has eroded. So they are targeting the non-Assamese people once again, particularly selecting the business communities in the small towns," he added.

Mahanta also did not rule out the role of opposition political parties in encouraging the militants. "Some parties who have been clamouring for President’s rule in the state and are worried that peace was returning to the state, are definitely behind this,"Mahanta added, pointing out indirectly at the Congress party.

It was only on October 22 and 23 that the ULFA had opened indiscriminate fire on Bihari and Marwari small-time businessmen in the Upper Assam towns of Naharkatiya and Doomdooma, killing five and eleven persons respectively.No medical aid: Last evening’s incident has also exposed how poor are medical facilities in the towns of Assam. While the people first took the injured persons to a local nursing home owned by a prominent BJP leader (who was a candidate in the last assembly by-polls), the owner simply pulled down shuuters and said No to them.

"And when we finally managed to take the victims to the Nalbari Civil Hospital, there were no doctors and nurses to attend to them," complained Mukesh Jai, secretary of the local chapter of the Marwari Yuva Manch.

He said that in the absence of ambulances, they had to take the victims on rickshaws and hand-pulled carts. "There were no stretchers in the government hospital, not to speak of bandage cloths or oxygen. Only one doctor was available. The others were busy watching the India-Sri Lanka cricket match on television," Mukesh Jain added.

And, when they took the injured to Guwahati by private cars, several private hospitals also turned them away, sating the cases involved insurgents and were required to be accompanied by the police, added Sandeep Chamariya, another local youth.

In the Nalbari Civil Hospital, Sanjay Babaj, who had lost his mother and two uncles, was also allegedly assaulted by the police "because I was shouting at the top of my voice, asking them to arrange ambulances to take the victims to Guwahati."

— Express News Service