In Assam, for all the assurances the Centre and the State are giving the people of the western part of Assam on security, more incidents of killing have been reported recently. That calls into question the ability of the Congress government in Assam and the UPA government in New Delhi of maintaining basic law and order. The irony of these assurances is that the Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi is urging the camp inmates to return to their homes while the killings have taken place exactly among those who took courage to return. So much for his administering the state. The basic question to be asked in Assam — and elsewhere — is why is the Centre and the State shying away from tackling the basic problem? Assam is not a state with vast grasslands with sparse population that anyone from outside could come and occupy freely. Geographically it is hemmed in with the vastly overpopulated Bangladesh pressing at it from all sides. What happened till 1971, may be ignored as the then East Pakistan was not friendly to us. After 1971, it was a golden opportunity for the Congress government to impress upon newly liberated Bangladesh to come to an agreement over the threat that Assam faces from the population pressures originating from Dhakha. Instead, the Congress governments, both at the Centre and the State, followed a policy of ‘business as usual’. The usual business was to let the impoverished people of Bangladesh swarm into Assam where they formed cheap labour since the ’30s. Most of the Congress leaders in the state were themselves huge landlords — for instance, Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed who later became the President of India. The Bangladeshi swarm was used by the Congress to swell the voters list and create a buffer for the party to remain in power. It is said of Ahmed that at an AICC session in the state he demonstrated his clout in numbers by publicly making the large number of his supporters — the Bangladeshi labour — virtually dance to his tune. He revelled at it and pushed Assam into a huge mess from which it has not recovered so far. There was a second opportunity when the IMDT Act was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. The Congress never tried to bring in a proper law to identify the outsiders and get them out of the state. It would not do so because they formed the good ballast for the Congress ship. Recall the fact that when the Assamese boycotted the state-wise elections the Centre imposed on it in 1983, the people did not go to the polling booths in large parts of the state. Only some 16 per cent voted and the voting percentage went up to about 30 only in areas where the infiltrators were in large numbers. The Saikia government that ruled Assam following the election was slipping on thin ice and the Congress at the Centre tricked the agitating students body AASU into an agreement partly at least to overcome the problem of ruling the state with a government that had no base among the people. The Congress in the ‘90s took advantage of the split in the Asom Gana Parishad and returned to power. The problem in Assam of massive infiltration from Bangladesh was never tackled either by the Congress or by the AGP in a logical manner and each one looked to its immediate advantage. How could the Congress afford to get rid of the infiltrators as they formed the ballast for its power in the state? As for the AGP, born just to tackle this problem, it was mired in the inner rivalries and its own incompetence so much so the very leader who pioneered the students movement against infiltration was thrown out of the party while he was the chief minister. The AGP was ready to commit political hara-kiri and the Congress enjoyed the fun. As infiltration went on unchecked and in Bangladesh jihadi parties gained ground, the flood from Dhaka now took a different turn. It was planned and administered to overwhelm the border districts of Assam and firmly bring them under Islamic grip. The rise of an attar seller to leadership and the formation and growth of a united front by Badaruddin Ajmal was the logical outcome of this well laid plan. The Congress should have foreseen this but instead it sought to get his assistance to win elections till he became larger than life. His party won 18 seats in Assam Assembly in last year’s election and is the main opposition. The party was aggressively mobilising the Muslim population of western Assam districts like Kokarajhar and Dhubri and nine others, to overcome the local tribal people, especially the Bodos, so as to push further and deeper into Assam. The Bodos were now in power after the Bodoland agreement to create autonomous administration there. The stage was set for the conflict. Strangely, Tarun Gogoi in the state and the prime minister at the Centre do not mention Ajmal’s role even by implication. So the Congress’ attempt to avoid naming the real culprits in the Assam situation is at the base of the present situation and it will not be resolved till the government is prepared to face the harsh truth. The Congress has taken to appeasement of fundamentalist sections of Muslims on a national scale as its main pincer in strengthening its electoral base. In the last three years, it has already lost whatever electoral support it managed to get in 2009 general election. Whether it is in postponing the carrying out of the punishment that the law has decreed on the Parliament attacker or in pursuing religion-based quota in public institutions and expenditures, it is the same appeasement working to retain at least the minority voters with it when it has lost ground heavily elsewhere. Only the other day the government has mandated the public sector banks to prioritise the minorities in giving loans in ‘districts dominated by such communities’ (read Muslims). So the country is to be divided along majority-minority lines and government investments would go not by any economic criteria but by political divisive preferences. Its refusal to name the basic cause of the Assam conflict is an extension of this electoral strategy. It is no wonder therefore that killings in Assam are continuing.