Learning from BTR

It is a matter of pride for Assam that the peace process in the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) has come to be recognized as one of the most successful experiments in the entire country in the post-Independence era. There is all the more reason to rejoice, because the recognition and appreciation have come from none other than Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of the country. That the Bodo issue has been resolved in a manner acceptable and beneficial to one and all has been further proved by the fact that national capital has hosted a large contingent of Bodo people—students, teachers, politicians, social activists, litterateurs, and intellectuals—who are there not to stage a dharna or protest demonstration but to participate in a festival that has been christened as Bodoland Mahotsav. As the Prime Minister, while inaugurating the Mahotsav, said, one could feel the happiness of a Bodo mother reuniting with her son, who went to the jungle, took up arms, and left her in desperation. Assam has witnessed a number of peace accords in the past forty years or so. But, taking the Assam Accord—the first peace accord in the entire region—signed in 1985, one can recall that the then dispensation at the Centre worked more towards putting spanners in the works than contributing towards its proper implementation. That is exactly why the basic issue flagged by the Assam agitation of 1979-85, the one about detecting and deporting lakhs of infiltrators of East Pakistan and Bangladesh origin, continues to linger and assume dangerous proportions today. In sharp contrast, the BJP-led regime at the Centre has not only lent whole-hearted support to the peace process but has ensured that the benefits of the peace process trickle down to every home and every family in the BTR. The leaders of the Bodoland movement thus have been able to trust the sincerity of the present regime without any doubt or hesitation, in the process becoming the most important stakeholders of the process to rebuild the region by consigning violence, hatred, and bitterness to the pages of history. Delhi’s open-armed support in the form of a financial package of Rs 1,500 crore to the BTR, supplemented by the Assam government’s release of funds amounting to Rs 4 lakh each to the 4,000-plus NDFB cadres for their development and rehabilitation, has brought about perceptible positive changes to the BTR.