----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2005 7:35
AM
Subject: Re: [Assam] Sunil Nath in
Tehelka
>It must be our desi gene that I
cannot understand you
*** I won't necessarily debate the point.
>But if you question the very
basis and legitimacy of such demands
*** That was in reference to your assertions.
>I had been voicing for such
a platform for a long time.
*** You are the one who asserted with 'logical' analysis that ULFA had no
basis for its demands or grievances for which it took up arms.
Then you turned around to recommend an alternative to ULFA to negotiate
with GoI, when talk of ULFA/GoI talks seemed like a possibility. I know you
have company, but it was amusing. Even people like Shantikam Hazarika
and Dainik Asom Editors see no point in negotiations between the ULFA
and GoI. That is from some of Assam's best among its movers and shakers.
If Assam had no grievances, no legitimate demands, then how come all of a
sudden an alternative forum is required to negotiate with GoI ? You may not
agree with ULFA's methods, but that is entirely different from Assam not
having legitimate grievances, including that of self-determination. Something
that its intelligentsia and its political class raised in the image of and
beholden to the degenerated Indian system and accountable to none, failed to
address, leading to the emergence of ULFA. That was what I wrote about when
you proposed it and Ram rah-rahed it a few days back.
What is the rationale here that I missed, other than seeming to try to
have it both ways?
At 11:07 PM -0500 6/29/05, Barua25 wrote:
>But this whole
thing is predicated upon whether there IS a problem, whether Assam has any
legitimate grievances or demands.
I think you
may call it my desi gene. I donot understand what you are trying to say
here. I think Roy's whole proposition was to come up with a set of alternate
practical demands for negotiation with GOI. But if you question the
very basis and legitimacy of such demands, and an Assamese suspects
that Assam may not have any legitimate demands at all, then how one
will negotiate with GOI and on what basis GOI will grant anything to
Assam. Without your knowledge you are also making ULFA's sacrice and
their struggle for the last 25 years a Hobo Diok type of big joke for
Assam. You are saying something like Tarun Gogoi who is saying now that
there is no problem of illegal immigration problem in Assam. The
question is how then you support Roy in his proposal to come up with a set
of alternate demands. Are you suggesting that someone should again come up a
set of alternate demands purely on emotion like ULFA did 25 years
ago.
It must be
our desi gene that I cannot understand you
I say Hobo
Diok.
Rajen
----- Original Message -----
From: Chan
Mahanta
To: Barua25 ;
[email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, June 29, 2005 10:06 PM
Subject: Re: [Assam] Sunil Nath in Tehelka
But this whole thing is predicated upon whether there IS a
problem, whether Assam has any legitimate grievances or
demands.
Those who cannot acknowledge that to begin with, cannot
possibly embark on developing those demands to bring to the table with
GoI, can they? If they do, they would be some of those despicable
characters that attempt to have it both ways.
At 9:55 PM -0500 6/29/05, Barua25 wrote:
>If forces
outside the ULFA want to influence the terms of negotiation and get
their ideas about what a secondary set of >demands ought to be, they
ought to go about forming public opinion on this independently of the
ULFA and hope the >organization will echo them in their own political
interest.
I agree in principle to
this idea. In fact I had been voicing for such a platform for a
long time. This we may call the Assam-GOI platform, outside of the
ULFA-GOI box (virtually ignoring ULFA). This is a must for
the Hobo Diok Assamese whether there is ULFA or not. The idea is to
come up with a set of sensible legitimate and rational demands for
Assam which ULFA itself cannot raise on technical grounds. For obvious
reasons, ULFA cannot (and should not) enter this platform during the
negotiation phase for reasons pointed out by you. (It would be incredibly stupid if the
leaders of the ULFA were to say we want independence for Assam and, by
the way, lets also talk about handing over the rights to oil extraction
to the state government.). In
fact ULFA should understand that this Assam-GOI platform is going to
discuss issues which ULFA cannot on its own discuss or negotiate due to
the position they are taking. This way ULFA can achieve something
without loosing face. Once GOI has agreed to grant some
agreed broad issues to Assam through this Assam-GOI discussions,
ULFA can later join the platform activley in finalization of
details.
Now the question is what
may be a set of such demands. This is not easy that one can just come up
with a list. It will need indepth study of Assam's onging problems. I am
really surprised that so far there has not been any such platform among
the Assamese population for discussion of these problems.
Even among the political parties there is no such
discussions. Frankly speaking this means that we donot know what we
want for Assam short of sovereignty.
In order to quantify what
we want and why we want we need to discuss among ourselves,
intellectually and rationally, so that we can decide what is in Assam's
best interest short of sovereignty and short of trying to throw the
Indian system out.
Rajen
Barua
.
----- Original Message
-----
From: "Roy, Santanu" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Wednesday, June 29, 2005 9:04
PM
Subject: RE: [Assam] Sunil Nath in
Tehelka
> I think one should not forget
the logical contradiction between demanding sovereignty and making
public a set of supplementary demands. This holds no matter how unlikely
or unrealistic the event that the GOI is going to agree to grant
independence. Sovereignty is virtually all encompassing. It would be
incredibly stupid if the leaders of the ULFA were to say we want
independence for Assam and, by the way, lets also talk about handing
over the rights to oil extraction to the state government.
> Even
if the ULFA leadership is not Harvard trained, they have at least shown
the intelligence to not say something like that.
> If forces
outside the ULFA want to influence the terms of negotiation and get
their ideas about what a secondary set of demands ought to be, they
ought to go about forming public opinion on this independently of the
ULFA and hope the organization will echo them in their own political
interest. But they should not expect that at this stage (and even many
stages ahead), the ULFA is going to go around publicly voicing the
details of their minimum acceptable point.
> Santanu.
>
>
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