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A Heartrending Account of a Most Horrendous Massacre of Our Time: A Review of Neelie, 1983: Asom Andolonor Borborotom Gonohatyar Postmortem Report
Neelie, 1983: Asom Andolonor Borborotom Gonohatyar Postmortem Report
(Neelie, 1983: A Postmortem Report into the Most Barbaric Massacre of Assam Movement)
Author: Diganta Sharma
Publisher: Eklabya Prakashan
Akhra Ghar, Molouali, Jorhat-785001,
Published on 30 October, 2007
Price: Rs. 55.00, Pages: 94
Language: Assamese.
Reviewed by Waliullah Ahmed Laskar
'Rabia Begum was feeding breast to her 17 month daughter sitting in a stool in the veranda of her road side house. Her other children were playing in the small courtyard. Her husband Chandeh Ali was busy with some work in the back side of the house. They did not even guess what was to come to them after a few minutes.
Suddenly the playing children rushed towards their mother in panic and grasped her. Already there were hue and cry around their house. Hearing desperate cries of his children when Chandeh Ali just entered the courtyard he saw a group of people around with swords, daggers, knives, tridents and petrol. Attackers got divided into three groups. One group chased running Chandeh Ali. Another group went to set fire on the house. And the other group started striking their weapons on children in their mother's lap. In minutes they were transformed into a heap of human limbs. The house was rendered into an ash-heap. And Chandeh Ali? A trident struck him from behind.
This is not a scene of a horror movie. These are the words from a chapter in the history of the independent secular socialist democratic republic of India which was written in some unknown villages in Nellie in the then district of Nogaon in Assam on Friday, 18 February, 1983, by workers of All Assam Students Union and All Assam Gono Sangram Parishad, the chauvinist groups of Assamese people, with the blood of more than 3000 Bengali speaking Muslims. Diganta Sharma depicted this and many other horrific scenes in his 'Nellie, 1983: A Postmortem Report into the Most Barbaric Massacre of Assam Movement', the book under review".
"Read. And be afraid". I read it and got afraid. Speaking frankly, I would not sleep in three consecutive nights after going through the book. The scenes haunt me like my own ghost. I am afraid, it will keep haunt me till I breath my last. I am terrified. Shaken to the core. I got somewhat disenchanted about the greatest animal. About human civilization. Indian civilization. When we show our such face as shown in Nellie and if we call ourselves beasts, it will be an insult to the beasts. Civilization gets sometimes wilder than the wildest. This is one of the situation where human beings are at their worst. It reminds one of Auschwitz. Birkenau. And such other hells in the earth. Nellie 1983 is one of the most horrendous genocide in the earth.
This book which can strike vigorously to the core of your concept of humanity was a result of painstaking investigation and an example of meticulous objectivity and bold journalism. The author Diganta Sharma, a young journalist with Guwahati based Assamese weekly Sadin killed many a myths surrounding the massacre.
He stripped off those who have kept exerting all of their energies to prove that the carnage was a handiwork of tribal groups such as Tiwa and Lalung and the Assamese had nothing to do with it. It was a severe slap on the faces of those who have been trying to get political mileage over each other making Assam a killing ground. The government claimed AASU and its allies are responsible for the blood bath. The president of AASU Nurul Hussain, as he was then, declared soon after the massacre that the violence was created by government agent." Mr. Hiteshwar Saikia, then chief minister of Assam claimed that workers of AASU and Gono Sangaram Parishad were directly involved in violence occurred in the state. Sharma reproduced a news item published in 17 April 1983 issue of Janakranti, which reads 'detailed orders were given in papers bearing names of some regional branches of the students union to attack different minority inhabited areas, the Chief Minister stated in a press meet in last Sunday.'
On the other hand, Sharma has shown how police machinery was involved in facilitating the killers to carry out the program. He reproduced a message sent by Jahiruddin Ahmed, the officer-in charge of Nogaon Police Station to the Commandant of 5th Assam Police Battalion in Morigaon, Officer-in charge of Jagi Road Police Station and Sub-Divisional Police Officer on 15 February, 1983 the contents of which are:
INFORMATION RECEIVED THAT L/NIGHT ABOUT ONE THOUSAND ASSAMESE OF SURROUNDING VILLAGES OF NELLIE WITH DEADLY WEAPONS ASSEMBLED AT NELLIE BY BEATING OF DRUMS (,) MINORITY PEOPLES ARE IN PANIC AND APPREHENDING ATTACK AT ANY MOMENT (,) SUBMISSION FOR IMMEDIATE ACTION TO MAINTAIN PEACE (,)
The police did nothing towards maintaining peace. Rather "the police acted in favour of facilitating the carnage and enjoyed it", Sharma adds. He quoted a few lines from the National Police Commission's Sixth Report Dealing With Recent Communal Riots and Role of the Police which reads "…….The National Police Commission has found that there is a tendency among the police officers to shun responsibility for dealing with communal situations.
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Writer Profile
W A Laskar
I am Waliullah Ahmed Laskar, male, 30, a student of law and engaged as a freelance journalist based in Guwahati, Assam, India.
I am also involved with a local Human Rights Organisation named Barak Human Rights Protection Committee.
I have taken my general education from Assam University, Silchar and now studying law under Gauhati University. I have also studied Islamic Religion, Law and History in India.
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Comments
justice RAHUL | Feb 16th, 2008
yah. justice!
BUT, WHAT ABOUT JUSTICE TO ASSAMS NATIVES WHO HAVE BECOME MINORITY IN THEIR OWN LAND DUE TO INFLUX FROM BANGLADESH........
JUSTICE RAHUL | Feb 16th, 2008
TAKE EXAMPLE OF THE DISTRICT BARPETA. THERE ARE A HANDFULL OF ASSAMESE MUSLIM VILLAGES WHO CONSTITUTE ABOUT 5% OF THE NATIVE PEOPLES.
BUT, TODAY, 80% OF PEOPLE ARE MUSLIMS. WHERE FROM THEY COME IF NOT FROM BANGLADESH?
WE ARE MINORITY IN OUR OWN LAND TODAY.
JUSTICE FOR WHOM?
Rahul Waliullah Ahmed Laskar | Mar 16th, 2008
Justice for human being. Every human being has the right to justice irrespectiv of his identity. If there are illegal migrants in in place they should be driven legally. As to Assam, there are some migrants, they are protected by politicians for their vested interest. They themselves are victims as the original people of Assam are also being deprived of resources due to their presence. The migrants should be dealt with as per international law. They should be deported to their country. But in the name of driving them no Indian citizen should be harassed.
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