Opinion March 20, 1983, Forty Years Ago: Violence In Assam

At least six people, including two women and two boys were killed, 26 houses set ablaze and eight bombs exploded in different parts of the trouble-torn Assam during the last 24 hours. Official reports in Gauhati said that a college student of oil town Digboi in Dibrugarh district was stabbed to death while he was returning from the market. Two women and their two minors were killed and their houses were set on fire.

UN Population Award

Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Chinese Family Planning Minister Qian Xinzhong are the joint winners of the UN Population Award, it was announced. The award committee chief, Anwar-ul-Karim Chowdhury of Bangladesh called it “an international recognition of their efforts to tackle the complex problems of two of the world’s largest populations.” Each of them will receive a diploma, a gold medal and $12,500 (roughly Rs 1,25,000).

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Karachi Riots

The death toll after a second day of rioting in Karachi between the Shia and Sunni sects rose to eight with over 50 injured, according to unofficial eyewitness accounts. Government authorities clamped a 24-hour curfew in Karachi’s Liaquatabad district with orders to police to shoot anybody trying to damage any public property.

Heroin Problem

Heroin is as easily available for the addict today as a toy or a pair of socks. The one-time preserve of a few is now ensuring rapidly growing numbers. The market is concentrated on the main street in Pahar Ganj. Individual contacts are merging into a mushrooming market. Exclusive contacts can no longer contain the heroin boom; it has found a regular market. “I’ve never been on another dope for years,” says an Indian addict. “But heroin has really taken over now.”