STATES: ASSAM

Hands Down

The Congress wins comprehensively in a vote against violence and government inertia but it inherits serious problems of insurgency, debt and unemployment

By Wasbir Hussain in Guwahati

It was a vote against violence and inertia. Seventy-five per cent of Assam's 14.43 million voters braved ULFA attacks on May 10 to exercise their franchise. The outfit, fighting since 1979 for a "sovereign, socialist Assam", had opposed the polls and was said to be behind the killing of 60 political workers, including a BJP candidate in the run-up to the elections.

It was a vote against inertia too. For five years, the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) did not deliver, dashing the hopes of an expectant people. The result: 18 of 26 AGP ministers lost the polls. Party president and chief minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta himself suffered a humiliating defeat in Dispur though he did manage to retain his traditional Barhampur seat in his native Nagaon district.

The Congress bagged 71 of the state's 126 assembly seats as against the AGP's 20 and 17 of its other allies, which include the BJP. "The people were fed up of rampant corruption, secret killings that went unsolved, job rackets, non-payment of salaries on time to government employees and so on," says H.N. Das, former state chief secretary.

Mahanta had led the AGP to victory for the second time in 1996. In late 1997 he brought the army, police and paramilitary forces in Assam under a unified command, with the army heading operations. The ULFA continued its strikes. The coordinated counter-insurgency offensives gathered momentum and the cat-and-mouse game went on. Mahanta survived an ULFA bomb attack in 1997 but his cabinet colleague Nagen Sharma was killed in a landmine explosion.

For the AGP, the writing on the wall started appearing in 1998 itself. In the parliamentary elections that year, the AGP drew a blank while the Congress won 10 of Assam's 14 Lok Sabha seats. It was the same in 1999: the Congress won 10 seats, the AGP nil. Realising that it didn't stand on firm ground, the AGP went for a poll tie-up with the BJP. State BJP leaders including its president Rajen Gohain opposed any alliance with the AGP. The BJP's central leaders, particularly L.K. Advani, strangely overruled the opposition and the pact was sealed. A section of angry BJP leaders led by the veteran Hiranya Bhattacharya quit the party, formed the Asom BJP and fielded 60 candidates.

The Congress was the gainer. "It was a suicidal pact. By coming together, both parties had actually conceded defeat even before the polls," says Debo Prasad Baruah, one-time AGP ideologue and former vice-chancellor of the Gauhati University. Mahanta, of course, blamed the ULFA for the defeat of the AGP-BJP alliance. "The militants backed Congress candidates at several places," he said.

Even allowing they did, the ULFA's welcome to the new Congress Government has been less than warm. Describing the Congress as "old wine in new bottle," the ULFA said, "People hope the Congress will not repeat its history of betrayal and fratricide." Newly sworn-in Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi himself is talking conciliation. "I'd like to begin by taking measures to bring about economic regeneration in the state and take it on the road to peace by addressing the insurgency problem with a sincere, realistic approach," he told INDIA TODAY. He has clearly spelt out his counter-insurgency policy: go in for a unilateral cease fire against separatist groups, restructure the Unified Headquarters by vesting operational command with the state police and initiate efforts for talks with the rebels through intermediaries. That will involve a tight-rope walk because of fears that the rebels could regroup once a truce was declared.

Insurgency apart, the other problems Gogoi faces are formidable too. Assam's debt burden stands at over Rs 10,000 crore, a mammoth government work force eats up almost 70 per cent of the state's annual budget and the unemployed continue to look at the government for jobs in the absence of avenues in the private sector. Gogoi has his task cut out for him-getting the job may well have been the easiest part.