The condition of the evicted peopleThe present condition of the evicted people in the area remains precarious. They are living in makeshift sheds made from tin, straw, and bamboo, with little hygiene, lack of safe drinking water supply, severe shortage of food, and no medical care whatsoever. It was reported that some NGOs and private bodies have reached some relief by way of food, and have installed some hand pumps for water, but given the enormity of the situation such help can only amount to less than a drop in the ocean.It is remarkable that our team did not find any trace whatsoever of any government agency reaching out to these people to provide relief in any form, which further attests to the deliberate and nefarious intent of the government in inflicting the carnage on the people.The underlying causes of the evident miseryGoing beyond the apparent misery of the people, we feel that the present misery is but a symptom of the far more deep rooted reasons which have threatened the livelihoods of a large section of the people in Assam over the years and for handling which no systematic and scientific policy has been evolved by successive governments.It is well recognized that river Brahmaputra and its tributaries have led to erosion of vast tracts of land in different parts of the state resulting in forced voluntary internal migration of the people within the state. This behaviour of river Brahmaputra begets a thorough scientific study to delineate the causes of riverine erosion, its social, economic and political impact, and to find out possible solutions. All of this should feed into formulation of a scientifically sound policy to provide relief to the people who are adversely affected by this phenomenon.However, in their obsession with self-interest, the ruling classes in the state have utterly lacked any concern towards this end. As their ability to address growing economic and social distress among the people consequent to the neo-liberal economic policies becomes more and more constricted, they find themselves with little option but to deepen the fault lines prevailing in the Assamese society for furthering their agenda.It is this context which engenders a confluence between the hard socioeconomic realities resulting from the riverine erosion phenomenon and the communal agenda of the present RSS-BJP government in the state. It is for this reason that the Bengali speaking Muslims need to be constantly painted as outsiders even though they have lived in Assam and contributed to its growth over generations.Divisions are sought to driven deeper between not just the Hindus and the Muslims, but also between the Assamese speaking and Bengali speaking Muslims. However, it need be recognized that the river does not differentiate between people following different faiths. The problem that has befallen Bengali speaking Muslims could very well fall upon other communities following other faiths, as is indeed evident in the form of an eviction notice served on the Hindu families of the Nath cult (deriving from the Gorakhnath cult in Gorakhpur of Uttar Pradesh) in Kaitasiddhi village near the Guwahati airport.The entire agricultural land of this village has already been taken over for the airport; however, after the airport was given over to the Adani group recently, the government now seeks to evict these villagers from their homestead land as well, perhaps to facilitate the development of the real estate by the Adani group around the airport.Given the circumstances, nothing could be more disastrous for the wellbeing of Assam and its people than pursuing such dangerous parochialism seeking to differentiate one section of the Assamese society from the other.No doubt every measure ought to be taken to ensure that there is no further infiltration from any quarter in to Assam that threatens to its demographic constitution; however, it is time that the Assamese people should closely reexamine the benefits Assam has derived from almost selective targeting of Bangla speaking Muslims even as the most fundamental problems of the people remain unaddressed as yet.
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