[Assam] Ghosh's subliminal suggestion of Gogoi co-operating with the ULFA & its aims?

[Bartta Bistar]

Gogoi gameplan may egg Ulfa on, leave egg on face

http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=1&theme=&usrsess=1&id=80011

Manash Ghosh in Kolkata
June 14. � At worst, it�s a transparent attempt to secure Ulfa�s support for the Congress in next year�s Assembly elections in Assam. At best, it�s an example of over-enthusiasm at the prospect of going down in history as the man who brought peace to the state. But Assam chief minister Mr Tarun Gogoi is going out of his way to appease the insurgent outfit and the cost may well be high, highly-placed official sources in New Delhi and Guwahati have told The Statesman. Last week, Mr Gogoi took to New Delhi the latest Ulfa demand for releasing 10 of its leaders from detention purportedly to facilitate the holding of a meeting to consider the Prime Minister�s request for peace talks.
Earlier, on a recommendation of the noted Assamese literary figure Ms Indira Raisom alias Mamoni Goswami, who has been acting as an intermediary between senior Ulfa leaders and the National Security Council Adviser, Mr MK Narayanan, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh invited the Ulfa for talks. In fact, at Ulfa�s insistence, the Centre has even conceded that the talks could be held outside India. It has gone to the extent of letting it be known that the Centre couldn�t prevent Ulfa from raising the issue of �Assamese sovereignty�. This marks a significant departure from the Centre�s earlier �firm and unequivocal � stand that India�s sovereignty over Assam is non-negotiable and has raised eyebrows both in Delhi and Guwahati.
It has now emerged that Mr Gogoi, in obtaining these concessions for Ulfa, has dealt directly with the Prime Minister�s Office bypassing altogether the ministry of home affairs (MHA) which is the nodal Central ministry for all internal security matters. Senior officials of the MHA are piqued that the PMO has knowingly undermined the established institutional arrangements and the authority of a vital unit of the Union government.
Mr Gogoi initiated the peace move at a time last year when Ulfa was reeling under reverses it had suffered at the hands of the Royal Bhutanese Army in December 2003. A large number of Ulfa cadres were killed and a huge cache of its sophisticated weaponry was seized. The outfit has yet to bounce back. Public outrage in Assam against Ulfa reached its peak during last year�s Independence Day celebrations at Dhemaji when it massacred innocent school children and, in October, killed 19 innocent civilians in serial attacks. Ulfa�s stock hit rock-bottom when, on top of all this, its closest ally, the National Democratic Front of Bodoland, signed a cease-fire agreement with the Centre. Its isolation was complete.
It is against this backdrop that political observers in Guwahati and Delhi question the rationale and wisdom of the Centre�s �policy of appeasement� towards Ulfa which, a top Union government official told The Statesman, �is entirely the brainchild of Mr Tarun Gogoi�.
In 1992, the then Congress chief minister, Hiteswar Saikia, was duped into freeing Anup Chetia, Pradip Gogoi and a host of other top Ulfa leaders from jail for holding peace talks with the Narasimha Rao government but the so-called �talks� inevitably failed and Ulfa leaders, taking advantage of the safe-passage clause provided in the talks agreement, merrily escaped to safe havens in Bangladesh and resumed the insurgency. Senior officials are worried that history will repeat itself and nothing will come of the present peace initiative as the Dhaka-based Ulfa leadership is completely under the control of Pakistan�s ISI and Bangladesh�s Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI). For, restoration of peace to the North-east is not, as may well be imagined, a priority for either of these foreign intelligence agencies.

 

 

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