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North East :Assam : Signs of hope on truce talks with Bodo militants

	May 16, 2005

Holding out hope on the Bodo militancy front, the Centre last week announced that Delhi would respond to the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB)’s ceasefire offer within a few weeks.



Union Home Secretary V.K. Duggal, who wound up his Northeast tour today, said the government was looking into the unilateral ceasefire offer. ‘We are looking into it and hope to respond within a few weeks. At the moment, let the elections (to the Bodoland Territorial Council) pass off peacefully.

The Bodo outfit had announced a unilateral ceasefire in October last year and recently extended it for another six months. The government is yet to reciprocate.

Duggal, however, did not disclose whether the government has established direct contact with the outfit. There are reports that three NDFB leaders are holding parleys with Home Ministry officials to finalise the modalities of the ceasefire.

Duggal was in the region to review the internal security scenario there. During his three-day tour, he visited Manipur, Meghalaya and Nagaland, besides Assam, and took stock of the situation.

He said apart from Manipur, law and order in the other three states was good. ‘Manipur needs more attention. We are pursuing the policy of peace through development there while keeping our doors open for talks with the militant groups,’ he added.

Duggal said work for the reconstruction of National Highway 59 was being taken up, which could serve as an alternative lifeline to the trouble-torn state.

Despite the NSCN (I-M) leader Thuingaleng Muivah’s tough talk, Duggal said the government was not giving up the hope of finding a peaceful solution to the Naga problem.

He said the peace process was going well in Nagaland and the only area of concern there was clashes between the two NSCN factions.

‘We have appealed to both groups to restrain themselves,’ he added.

The Home Secretary also announced a new surrender policy for the Northeast militant outfits, which he said was on a par with the similar package in Jammu and Kashmir, but more attractive.

According to the new policy, the vocational training period for the surrendered militants has been increased from 12 months to 36 months so that they could pursue a ‘comprehensive vocational training package’.



Jailed ULFA leaders to be freed ?

In a related development, the Union Government which expressed its willingness to hold a peace dialogue with another banned militant outfit of Assam, the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) recently, is reported to be thinking in terms of freeing all senior leaders of the group to smoothen the progress of the talks.

A Home Ministry official on conditions of anonymity said that the government had taken a similar kind of a decision during its peace talks with the National Democratic Front of Bodoland. He also said that Dr. Mamoni Roisom Goswami, who had been acting as a mediator between ULFA and the Centre also had requested for the release of the leaders prior to the peace talks.



Bodo council polls

The elections to the Bodo Territorial Council scheduled over the weekend will help assess the public view of what the new rulers have been able to achieve in the past year and a half since they came to power after the accord between the Bodo Tigers Force and the Government of India.

That accord promised many things, including industrial training institutes, better infrastructure and other goodies as part of a Rs 84-crore package. Truth to tell, until last September, the BTC hadn’t seen the money (promised in January 2004 at the time of the accord) and was getting fretful. At the time, the Ministry for the Development of the North-eastern region contacted consulting groups. They were short-listed and told to come up with a development plan for the area in one month flat! The slack and the sudden haste were embarrassing, especially since it was the Assam state government that was reported to be holding back the funds.

What happened to the development plan will be tested at the polls. There are internal battles, as usual, in a ruling elite and pressures from other groups. The ruling BLT, it is said, is confident despite the internal cleavages. And, interestingly, its leadership does not seem to be too concerned about the likelihood of talks between the Centre and the National Democratic Front of Bodoland. The NDFB continues its unilateral ceasefire, which is a measure of its desperation, and talks will probably begin soon after the new council is in place.



Exodus of Bangladeshi settlers

Waking up to the exodus of a section of minorities from the Upper Assam town of Dibrugarh, the state Government has mounted pressure on the district administration to ensure that the situation triggered by an organisation’s ‘economic sanctions’ on illegal Bangladeshi settlers does not acquire a communal hue.

After instructions from the Home Department, the Dibrugarh administration is understood to have received a separate directive from Minister of State for Home Rockybul Hussain to ‘contain the flight of people and take steps to ensure that the situation does not take a communal colour’.

Congress MP Anowar Hussain, who is from Dhubri, was among those who contacted the administration to enquire about the exodus. A Congress leader said the people who had been ‘hounded out’ were ‘genuine Indian citizens,’ most of them hailing from Dhubri district.

A senior police official said there was no sign yet of any communal disturbance. ‘Nobody has lodged any complaint so far. There is also no sign of any communal backlash. In any case, we are regularly patrolling the potentially trouble-prone areas and are prepared to handle any crisis.’

The Chiring Chapori Yuba Mancha, whose campaign against Bangladeshi settlers led to the exodus, thanked the people for supporting its move and urged ‘indigenous Muslims’ not to be frightened. He said economic sanctions should be used to drive out illegal settlers from other districts too.

In Jorhat, the All Assam Students Union said its executive committee would decide how to go about removing illegal migrants from the district. Biren Saikia, president of the AASU’s Jorhat unit, said central leaders of the student organisation have given the local unit ‘full freedom’ to take a decision on the issue.



New outfit spreads wings in rebel hub

The newly-formed militant Bengal Tiger Force (BTF) has added to the security worries along the Assam-Manipur border. An official source in Jiribam sub-division, which is under the jurisdiction of the Imphal East administration, said the fledgling outfit was a potential source of trouble because of its growing clout among the Bengali-speaking Hindus and Muslims inhabiting clusters of villages stretching from Jakuradhar to Bekhera in southwest Manipur.

The BTF was ostensibly formed after militants of the United National Liberation Front (UNLF) and the People’s Liberation Army, two of the stronger armed groups of Manipur, began harassing and extorting money from non-tribal residents of the area.