AGP, BJP close ranks after killings

By Barun Dasgupta

NALBARI (ASSAM), MAY 4. Time: 10.30 a.m. Place: Nalbari Civil Hospital. Inside, lie the cold and stiff bodies of six Asom Gano Parishad (AGP) workers gunned down by ULFA at Bogurihati, 8 km from here, on Thursday night.

Outside, several thousand angry and excited AGP and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) supporters are shouting ``murdabad'' slogans against the ULFA, its self-styled ``commander-in-chief'', Mr. Paresh Barua, and the Congress which, they believe, has ``nexus'' with the militant outfit.

Until recently, the workers of the two parties were resentful of their leaders' decision to strike an alliance. Today, death has demolished the barriers of distrust and hostility and forged an emotive bond between them.

Before the closed gates of the morgue, where post mortem of the bodies is being done, relations of the slain cry in paroxysms of inconsolable grief.

One steals a look at the faces of the victims. They are calm and there is no sign of agony. Death must have been instantaneous, even before they realized what was happening.

The State Agriculture Minister and AGP general secretary, Mr. Chandra Mohan Patowary, in whose constituency of Dharmapur, adjacent to Nalbari, Bogurihati falls, is convinced that the Congress is behind the recent killings. (The Bogurihati killing is the 11th by ULFA after the elections were announced, taking the death toll to 24.)

Describing the incident, Mr. Patowary says the three assailants, armed with AK-47 rifles, came on foot around 8.45 p.m. and walked away nonchalantly after doing their bloody deed.

``There is a Congress election office adjacent to our office, only four metres away'', he says. ``The Congress workers there were not touched. They were drinking tea as if nothing had happened.''

We meet the Nalbari District Congress Committee president, Mr. Jnanendra Malla Buzarbaruah. He repeats the usual party line: ``We are against all acts of violence'' and complains that at two places, Congress poll offices were burnt and a party worker, Satya Kalita, was killed at Ghograpar.

No, they are not feeling insecure, he says. Does he fear retaliation from the AGP-BJP ? Will the AGP-BJP propaganda holding the Congress responsible for the killings affect the Congress poll prospects ?

He replies hesitantly: ``We cannot say whether there will be retaliation. If there are more such incidents, our poll prospects may be affected.''

Meanwhile, the bodies have been taken out of the morgue to the local AGP office and are on the way to Borguihati for cremation. Mr. Patowary blames the Election Commission squarely: ``If they had accepted our plea for holding the elections in three phases, much better deployment of security forces would have been possible and such tragedies could have been avoided.''

Security is the Achilles' heel of the Government. Mr. Patowary says this morning, both the Governor and the Chief Minister were to visit Nalbari. But police said they would not be able to provide security to two VIPs; only one should come.

In the event, the Chief Minister, Mr. P.K. Mahanta, decided not to come. It is the Governor, Mr. S.K. Sinha, who did.

Indeed, the top police officials who were till recently bragging that the ULFA was ``finished'', that its ``back has been broken'', that it is ``totally isolated'', are now singing a different tune. ``We never said the ULFA has been finished, we only said it had been weakened'', they now plead.

Meanwhile, the people of this terror-stricken State live in constant fear: when will the news of the next spate of killings come?

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