Assam CM Sarma claimed visiting Pakistan without reporting invites lifelong blackmail through photos or videos by hostile forces.
He accused Congress leader Gaurav Gogoi and his wife of links to Pakistan’s ISI, backed by a recent SIT report.
Sarma vowed to reveal details publicly while targeting opposition ahead of Assam’s assembly elections.
Assam CM Warns Against Pakistan Visits, Links Congress Leaders to ISI
Ahead of state elections, Sarma accuses Congress’s Gaurav Gogoi and wife of Pakistani ties, citing SIT findings and warning of lifelong blackmail.
Summary
Himanta Biswa Sarma, the chief minister of Assam, on Monday warned that anyone who travels to Pakistan without telling the local government will be "blackmailed by them" for the rest of their lives. Sarma has been accusing state Congress president Gaurav Gogoi and his wife of having ties to Pakistan.
According to PTI the chief minister didn't say who would be responsible for the "blackmail."
If someone goes to Pakistan, he insisted, they had to report their activities to the Indian government.
“Whether he has gone once or twice is not the thing. He himself has admitted that he had gone to Pakistan,” Sarma told reporters here on the sidelines of a programme, when asked about Gogoi’s comments on his links with the bordering nation at a conclave organised by Guwahati-based satellite channel ‘Pratidin Time’ in the national capital.
“If someone goes to Pakistan, they have to inform the government of India how long they stayed, whom they met, with whom they clicked pictures, whose houses they visited,” he said.
PTI reported that Sarma maintained that if someone were to visit Pakistan without informing the authorities, they would be “blackmailed by them” for their entire lives by threatening to release photos and videos of the trip.
“If I go to Pakistan without telling anyone, won’t there be photos and videos of me there, meeting their people, army, ISI, etc. They will call me later and say that now that you are the CM, you have to do as we say,” he claimed.
Seeking to dismiss Gogoi’s statement at the conclave that he had gone to Pakistan after his marriage as his wife was working there, Sarma said, “There is no connection whatsoever between getting married and going to Pakistan. People go to Switzerland, Kashmir, England, America after marriage, but have you ever heard anyone going to Pakistan?” The BJP leader maintained that the Congress MP “might have slipped away by sharing half-baked details about his Pakistan trip in front of 80 people at the conclave”.
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“But he cannot get away in front of 3.5 crore people of Assam,” Sarma asserted.
Over the past three months, Sarma has been accusing Gogoi and his British wife, Elizabeth Colburn, of having ties to the Pakistani spy organisation ISI.
On February 17, 2025, the Assam Cabinet established a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to look into the alleged "anti-India activities" of Pakistani national Ali Tauqeer Sheikh and his accomplices. Sheikh is alleged to have ties to Colburn.
On September 10, the SIT formally delivered the report to the Chief Minister under the direction of Special DGP (CID) Munna Prasad Gupta.
According to Sarma, the 96-page SIT report was "prepared with limited means, yet carrying heavy truths." Deep pain was evoked by a single look, demonstrating how quickly legacy may be traded for shadows and roots severed.
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Under the legal process, the report's contents will soon be made public, and he had previously stated that he would provide the media with as much information as possible, excluding any sensitive material.
Next year, the state is scheduled to hold assembly elections.
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