From Bullets To Ballots

The election results of May 11, 2006, brought in new, though notunanticipated, power players into Assam’s Legislative Assembly, and, if theircurrent demands are even partially met, possibly into the state’s government.The same players, moreover, who were, not long ago, designated as terrorists,and had relentlessly waged war against the state and the democracy that has nowcatapulted them into the arguable position of ‘kingmakers’.

The Hagrama Mohilary faction of the Bodo People’s Progressive Front (BBPF-H),with its leadership comprising principally of surrendered militants of the BodoLiberation Tigers (BLT), secured an overwhelming victory in the Bodo TerritorialCouncil (BTC) areas, capturing 12 out of the 18 seats it contested in the126-member Assam Assembly.

The centrality of this victory is underlined by the fact that Chief MinisterTarun Gogoi’s Congress party has returned to power with drastically reducedmargins, and just 53 seats in the Assembly, well below the halfway mark, makingit dependent on BBPF’s support to form a government. Cashing in on thisdependency, the BBPF has demanded its pound of flesh, demanding at least fourministerial berths and the post of a deputy Chief Minister in the newGovernment.

The BBPF-H’s arch-rival, the Rabiram Narzary faction, BBPF-R, also won asolitary seat from Tamulpur. The Assembly election results, in combination withthe outcome of the May 2005 elections to the BTC, put the BBPF-H in firm controlof the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) areas, and of Bodo politics, raisingpiquant questions, not only of legitimacy and moral authority, of the policy ofcreating autonomous areas and councils under pressure from violent politicalgroupings, but more urgently, regarding the ongoing talks with the other Bodomilitant group, the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), that iscurrently negotiating the terms of its ‘return to mainstream politics’ withthe Centre.

The policy of satisfying militant demands through the establishment ofautonomous councils has failed repeatedly in redressing public grievances andmeeting popular aspirations in the Northeast and is failing yet again in Assam’sBodo dominated areas. The war of attrition between former brothers in arms, theBLT and the All Bodo Students’ Union (ABSU), has ensured that the objective ofproviding good governance to the Bodo population through the arrangementsenshrined in the Sixth Schedule of the Indian Constitution has again fallen preyto the political ambitions of factional leaders. This schism has, moreover,created enough space for the NDFB – currently operating under a ceasefireagreement with the government – to reclaim its position among the sections ofthe Bodo population.

The formation of the BTC on December 7, 2003, had brought an end to thethree-year dialogue process between the BLT and the government of India andraised fresh hopes that good governance, now to be administered by the Bodosthemselves, would keep militant and secessionist tendencies at bay. The BTC, infact, was a repetition of a similar experiment in 1993, which went awry.Following the first Bodo Accord of 1993, a Bodoland Autonomous Council (BAC) hadbeen established, but that hurriedly signed accord faltered on various counts,the most significant being the absence of a clear-cut geographical boundary forthe BAC, which led eventually to its denunciation by the Bodo groups who wereinitially parties to the Agreement.

With the failure of the BAC, the ‘statehood’ demand was once againrevived by a new brand of militancy led by the BLT, which scorched the Bodoheartland of Assam. The violence diminished, however, after the BLT declared aunilateral ceasefire in July 1999 in response to the union government’s appealfor talks. After a series of negotiations, the BLT gave up the demand for aseparate Bodoland state on October 2, 2001, and reconciled themselves topolitical-administrative arrangements for autonomy under the Sixth Schedule.

The successful end to the negotiations witnessed one of the largest surrenderceremonies in the country on December 6, 2003, when 2,641 BLT militants badefarewell to arms at Kokrajhar town. A 12-member interim BTC, led by the former‘chief’ of the now disbanded BLT, Hagrama Mohilary, was constituted atKokrajhar, but the rehabilitation of surrendered BLT cadres remained a difficulttask. Indeed, about half of them had already been recruited into theparamilitary forces (Central Reserve Police Force - 339, Border Security Force -300, Assam Rifles- 150, and another 400 as Special Police Officers) as a part ofthe Agreement reached on the eve of the formation of the Council. However,failure to provide compensation packages to the remaining surrendered cadrescontinues to rankle.

The Council had tremendous challenges before it. However, cooperation betweenthe BLT and the ABSU was seen as sufficient to tide over such challenges. Therewas also the challenge of the non-Bodos who, under the Sanmilita Jana GosthiyaSangram Samity (SJSS), an amalgam of 18 non-Bodo organizations, spearheaded anagitation against the BTC. In addition, there was a funds crunch that affectedthe timely implementation of development projects. Power, however, remained agreat cohesive force for some time, giving Mohilary, the BTC chief executive,the confidence to claim, on June 2, 2005, that he would ‘change the fate’ ofthe Bodoland in three years time.

The NDFB, however, remains an abiding challenge to the political arrangementarrived at with the BLT. Differences between the NDFB and former BLT leaders andcadres have resulted in a continuous stream of fratricidal clashes, despite the‘disarming’ of the latter, and the ‘ceasefire’ with the former. OnDecember 6, 2003, the NDFB had specifically opposed the formation of the BTC,terming it as an exercise in futility and warning people that this was a moveagainst the interests of the Bodo community. An NDFB statement issued to thelocal media declared: "The creation of the council was an exercise in futilityand will go down in history as the day a group of opportunists surrendered theBodo dream before New Delhi."

As expected, elections to the Council were not held in time, and when held,on May 13, 2005, were marred by violence, with at least one person killed andanother 26 injured in poll-related clashes.

The high hopes of the Bodos following the formation of the BTC were quicklyshattered when former BLT leaders fell out with the former leaders of the ABSUin their bid to control Bodo politics. The nascent Bodo People’s ProgressiveFront (BBPF), formed at Kokrajhar on April 12, 2005, at the behest of the ABSUand former BLT militants, underwent a sudden split on the eve of the Councilelections. The divide in the BPPF came mainly as a result of Mohilary’ssupport to some former militant comrades who had contested Council elections asindependent candidates against official candidates of the BBPF. Manoj KumarBrahma, one of Mahilary’s close confidents, for instance, was pitted againstRabiram Narzary, the founding president of the BPPF, at Banargaon. Nevertheless,on June 2, 2005, an 11-member Executive Council headed by Mahilary was sworn inat Kokrajhar, to run the 46-member BTC.

Post-poll violence continued to rock the Bodo heartland with two rival BPPFfactions engaged in violent clashes – attacking villages, torching houses andindulging in vandalism. A sampling of some of the incidents in the month ofApril in the current year alone provides an index of the relentless strife:

April 28: Unidentified miscreants shot at and injured a villageheadman and his wife at Mahendrapur village in the Kokrajhar district. The BPPF-Raccused the BPPF-H for the attack.

April 19: BPPF-R called a 12-hour Kokrajhar District bandh(shut down) in protest against the District administration’s failure tomaintain law and order after the killing of Lwithwma Borgoyari, a schoolteacherand former adviser to the ABSU, on April 9.

April 17: All Bodo Women’s Welfare Federation (ABWWF) called a12-hour Assam bandh in protest against the alleged assault on its president,Kanan Basumatary, by miscreants suspected to be the supporters of the BPPF-R atKokrajhar on April 9.

April 15: Miscreants suspected to be the supporters of the BPPF-Rassaulted two persons, Riten Brahma and Toba Brahma, believed to be supportersof the BPPF-H at Sukhanjhora village in Kokrajhar District.

April 14: A youth was lynched at Kalaigaon in the Udalguri District.The BPPF-H held the BPPF-R responsible for the assault.

April 13: Over a dozen houses were vandalised at Elengmari, Sursakhata,Bwigribari and Nwinaguri in the Kokrajhar District.

April 12: Four houses were set ablaze at Chetnaguri and Hasraobari inthe Kokrajhar District.

April 9: Unidentified assailants brutally hacked to death LwithwmaBorgoyari, a school teacher who was also an adviser of the Simbargaon unit ofthe ABSU, at Hetnaguri in the Kokrajhar District.

The split in the BPPF and subsequent clashes between the supporters of thetwo factions have been a boon for the NDFB, which has consolidated its lostposition among the Bodos. Its ceasefire with the government has also raisedhopes that the outfit might be able to secure a better deal than the present BTC– though it is difficult to see what more the government could offer. When theNDFB signed the ceasefire agreement with the union and state governments on May25, 2005, there was jubilation within a large section of the Bodo community.However, the proposed negotiations are expected to be difficult, since theoutfit is yet to give up its original demand for a sovereign state of Bodoland.

Ominously, the BPPF-R is now entering into what appears to be a stablealliance with the NDFB. The formation of the Bodoland People’s ProgressiveYouth Front and the Bodoland People’s Progressive Women’s Front by the BPPF(Hagrama Mohilary faction) on January 28, 2006, was widely perceived as areaction to the BPPF-R announcement that it would go for an electoralunderstanding with the NDFB in the then scheduled Assam State Assemblyelections. Declaring his affiliation to the NDFB on the eve of the elections,Rabiram Narzary stated: "The NDFB also needs candidates to air their views.They can back some of their chosen ones. There are options open for anunderstanding with them." However, he said his party did not want to use theNDFB as a means to ensure victory.

With the BPPF having secured dominance in the BLT and now gaining astranglehold in the governing coalition at Guwahati, its power in Bodo politicswill be difficult to challenge for the next five years. Other politicalformations will, consequently, be increasingly tempted to violence to underminethis influence, even as the government will have little to offer the survivingBodo militant group, the NDFB, to secure its return to democratic politics. Thedivisions within Bodo politics are violent and wide, and appear destined tobecome more so in the foreseeable future.

Amarjeet Singh is Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management.Courtesy, the South Asia Intelligence Review of the South Asia Terrorism Portal