THE BJP government in Assam is linking the recent visit of Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge to the state, to the clashes in Goalpara on Thursday, which led to the death of a 19-year-old. The violence erupted five days after an eviction exercise targeting homes of 1,080 families, including the killed teenager’s, had passed off without incident.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has accused the Congress of “instigating” the evicted families, while the Opposition has slammed the administration for “inhumane treatment” towards the families left homeless.
The massive eviction drive in Goalpara district on July 12 had razed homes of 1,080 families across 140 hectares. Many of the affected families had not moved out of the site yet but made makeshift arrangements, like tarpaulin tents, claiming they had nowhere else to go.
On Thursday, when the authorities were trying to cut off the main access road to the bulldozed settlement, a violent confrontation started between the families and police and forest guards. Shawkar Ali died while two others received bullet injuries when police opened fire. More than a dozen police and forest guards were injured in the clash.
Later, local MP Rakibul Hussain and MLA Abul Kalam Rasheed Alam, both of the Congress, visited the affected families and attended the final rites of Ali, even carrying the coffin for some time.
Forest official Sunnydeo Indradeo Choudhury said the Forest Department aimed to cut off all access except one to the eviction site, to stop people from coming to it. According to him, even people not from the settlement were setting up camp there so that they could claim compensation.
During their one-day visit to Guwahati, one of the issues raised by Gandhi and Kharge was the large-scale eviction drives carried out by the Sarma government. Kharge said that if the Congress came to power in next year’s Assembly elections, it would rebuild the razed homes.
Sarma said that with their speeches, the Congress leaders had “instigated” the evicted families, and that their local party workers had added fuel to the fire. “On Wednesday night, the families were provoked by district Congress members. In the morning, police and forest officials on duty were attacked brutally by the families, with bricks, sticks, machetes. The whole night, preparations were made,” the CM said Thursday evening, adding that a case had been registered and the “conspirators” would be booked. “If required, we will summon Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge for questioning.”
MLA Alam said that it were the authorities who were responsible for the eruption of violence at the eviction site. “No food or alternative shelter had been given to the people, and then they dug up the road via which concerned people were providing them food and water, cutting off relief. And when the people got agitated, they shot to kill. I suspect that this was deliberate to create fear,” Alam told The Indian Express, pointing out that the eviction site had emptied out after the violence.
“Not a single person remains, and when the voter list is updated now, since there will be no houses and no people, they will be removed from the voter list. It is a political conspiracy to remove people from voter lists,” Alam said.
Last month, 660-odd families had been evicted from Hasila Beela village, also in Alam’s Goalpara East constituency.
At a press conference earlier this week, Sarma had stated that across districts, officials had been told to strike off those evicted from the voter lists of that area, calling it a means to “protect Assamese constituencies”.
AIUDF MLA Rafiqul Islam likened the actions of the Sarma government in trying to cut off relief to the affected families by destroying access roads to what is happening in Gaza.
People had not reacted even when thousands of them were evicted, Islam pointed out. “They had wept and emptied their homes and watched as the houses were destroyed. There was no commotion. But even after that, the authorities were coming, removing their tents and pushing them to leave the area, when they have nowhere else to go. And then they cut off the road so that they could not receive relief.”
Islam added: “Our stand is very clear. If people have to be evicted, they must be given rehabilitation beforehand.”
The Goalpara eviction was the latest in a series of such actions conducted in the state over the past month, affecting four districts, with homes of over 3,300 families – mostly Bengali-origin Muslims – razed.
This week, Sarma claimed that around 50,000 people have been evicted from approximately 160 sq km of land since his government took office in 2021, adding that one of the aims of these evictions was to stem “demographic invasion” by “people of one religion”, in what was seen as a reference to Bengali-origin Muslims.