The trigger for revisiting this buried account of Assam’s industrial past is a peace accord signed in New Delhi on Friday (December 29) by the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), the deadliest of the state’s insurgent outfits which have laid down arms and joined the mainstream during the recent years. The refusal of one faction of the outfit, the ULFA-Independent, to shun violence will no doubt be a lingering concern, but Assam is all set to pass through the most peaceful phase in post-independence era, as all other militant outfits in Bodo and Karbi dominated areas in the state have already surrendered, making most part of the state free from the clutches of insurgents.
As peace attracts capital, “Invest Assam” should be the next battle cry. The governments, both in New Delhi and Dispur, should display an unwavering commitment to woo investors to the state that has experienced a downturn in its economic fortunes. An influx of capital will spur economic growth, create jobs, help end alienation and make peace a permanent feature.
After India’s independence, Assam, unlike its peers, barely found a moment to act on its strengths and prosper. Its Naga and Lushai Hills (later Mizoram) districts got engulfed with militancy of a gigantic proportion. As the state became synonymous with separatism and militancy with cycles of violence, there was no question of Assam wooing any big-ticket industrial investments then.
And then came ULFA in 1979 with a stated objective to create a sovereign Assam. It was around the time Assam plunged into a massive agitation against illegal migrants coming from Bangladesh through a long porous border. While the agitation was still on, the militant group first dispatched some of its cadres to Kachin state in northern Myanmar for military training. It gathered strength only in the late 1980s when a friendly government led by Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) was helming the state. What followed were a series of political killings and random raids on businesses.
In 1986, the outfit carried out a daring armed robbery at a State Bank of India branch in Namrup; in 1988, it killed senior executives of Oil India Ltd. and Hindustan Fertilizer Corporation; in 1990, it kidnapped a general manager of Guwahati Refinery, and in the following year, it eliminated a Russian miner engaged in a coal field in Assam. In November 1990, just days before the Indian Army launched Operation Bajrang to flush out the ULFA militants, the Union Home Ministry in a special operation had to airlift some senior executives of Unilever Ltd. from an Upper Assam town of Doom Dooma. The list of ULFA’s corporate victims is pretty long. The bottom line is, by 1990, the faint glimmer of hope that Assam would get its mojo back with industrial development fizzled out.Today, many decades later, the state is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. During this turbulent period, the infrastructure in Assam and for that matter in the entire Northeast region has however undergone a considerable upgrade. During the last one decade, for instance, seven new airports have been added to the region, the last one being Arunachal’s Donyi Polo airport located bang on the border of Assam. Select entrepreneurial successes of the recent past – e.g. export of Assam’s leteku (Burmese grapes) to Dubai – has also helped spread positive vibes.What is needed now is an aggressive “Invest Assam” campaign to bring in capital, build industries, create private jobs, and help this new-found peace process sustain. The Assam government’s attitude should be — it is now or never.
(Views are personal)
