Secularist communalism - Assam riots a case study

In an excellent piece of journalism Dr. Engineer describes how monstrous attacks, by Bodo tribal community, has wounded peaceful innocent "Bengali speaking Muslims". Author, an eminent secular historian, mentions 58 person killed and nearly 400,000 displaced out of which 300,000 were Muslims. However, author does not mention a word on religious/ethnic identity of those killed and remaining displaced persons. The religious identity of victims is kept undisclosed for many reasons. Though, mysterious hiding of "religious" affiliation of victims can be manipulated by secular groups on later analysis of this riot.  

Secularism is a political movement. This political movement, on one hand claims to protect rights of certain religious groups, on other hand it demonizes native ethnic groups. The method of demonetization of local ethnic community is based on suitably revealing information. According to Dr. Engineer clashes began "with 4 Bodo youth who came on motor cycle on 6th July with guns and killed two Muslims and ran away". It is surprising that Dr. Engineer directly blames Bodo youth for killing of Muslims without presenting any supportive evidence. However, in retaliation "unknown people (assumed to be Begali Muslims) killed four ex-militant Bodos". Interesting to note here is that when attackers on Muslims can be clearly identified as Bodos, Muslim attackers becomes "unknown people" in secular framework.

The rediff.com reports that "trouble started on May 29 with the Muslim youth group, the All Bodoland Minority Students' Union (ABMSU), protesting against the removal of a signboard from a mosque, allegedly illegally built on a forest area". This explains Bodo agitation is, against Muslims, on their land encroachment. Subsequently, "Bodoland Territorial Council administration prevented the protesters from forcing shops and offices to close". In contrast to Dr. Engineer, the source reports "on July 6, two Muslim youths were killed by unidentified gunmen in Kokrajhar district". Later "on July 19, two more Muslim youths, leaders of the ABMSU, were killed in the same district". This gives an impression that retaliation was not envisaged before leaders of ABMSU were killed. Since attackers were unknown, target was local minority. As Dr. Engineer asserts, "Bodos are no more than one-third of the population in that area (even less than that)", Bodos were soft target to attack. In a quick payback mode, "four former Bodo Liberation Tigers cadres were killed by a Muslim mob", on July 20. 

Dr. Engineer argues that "besides Muslims there are other people too like Koch Rajbonshis, Santhals and Adivasis though Muslims constitute majority of non-Bodo people". This minority statistics supports a calculated guess that Muslims form overall majority in that area. 

Illegal immigration of Muslims is not unknown in Assam. It has been argued that increase in Muslim population is predominantly resulted from illegal immigration from Bangladesh. However, this important phenomena is completely ignored by Dr. Engineer. Instead of addressing this issue concerning national security, Dr. Engineer recommends, "Territorial Council should be annulled". Thus, legitimizing illegal infiltration. In a best diversionary tactic, Dr. Engineer argues that BJP has "added much fuel in propagating that Bangladeshi Muslims are migrating in large numbers giving highly exaggerated figures without any basis". On the other hand, he ignores the data from "Directorate of Census, Government of India" (cited in "Assam Burning"; CenterRightIndia) showing disproportionate increase in a specific religious group in Assam - A significant indicator of infiltration of Bangladeshi Muslims. Since Bangladeshi Muslims speak "Bengali" as their native language, Dr. Engineer conveniently merges them with Indian Muslims by depicting them as "Bengali speaking Muslims".


In conclusion, in the name of secularism, a specific flavor of communalism (Islamism) is being imparted on native bodo tribal of Assam. This kind of secularism promotes reverse communalism (anti-islamic sentiment) among the native people and harms national security and social balance. This kind of secularism might have given rise to organization such as BLT. These organizations exist to oppose state approved settlement of illegal immigrants. However, they are portrayed as trouble makers by the state and central Government. Secular press yet to label "BLT" as "Hindu" terrorist organizations to demonize "Hindu" society in international forums.

Secular justification of Assam Violence

I had lengthy debate with a "Secular" tweeton @brownbrumby on continuing violence in Assam. One particular feature noticed is that whomsoever tries to criticize congress, critic gets "RSS" tag. This "Secular" bloc firmly believes that on going conflict in Assam is "ethnic" and not "communal". By saying "ethnic", this "Secular" bloc deliberately hide/deny important issue of illegal infiltration from Bangladesh.

This debate forced me to think who are "Secular" that forms "Secular Bloc".  "Google Intelligence" helped me find "Secularist Manifesto" on leftist Guardian. It added to my knowledge that secularism is a "political movement seeking specific policy end-points". Now that specific policy "end-points" may differ in space and time. This "Secularist Manifesto", in case of United Kingdom (UK), is against overwhelming presence of "Christianity" in the state parliament. This manifesto is to protect human rights of "non-christians" and/or "un-christian" legal residents of UK. Thus, it presents a very sensible case of the legal state subjects. But does it applicable to illegal residents in UK? If yes, why UK need to spend money on border security and legal immigration system? I leave it for UK nationals to decide.

Yes, I was arguing with my wrong concept of "Secularism" in this discussion.  I had previously hypothesized that "Secularism" refers to "religious neutrality". I firmly believed that "Secularism" has nothing to do with politics. In my view, politics combined with religion is a toxic mix that ruin the state. For example, in Nigeria where religion used in politics led to ethnic conflict between northern (Muslim majority) and southern (Christian majority) states. Nigeria is now at the verge of its partition on this religo-ethinc line just like Sudan. Sudan and Nigeria provide evidence that religion can not be ruled out as a driving force for ethnic violence.

Assam violence has illegal immigration problem at the core that has posed threat to its socio-cultural identity. The first president after independence of Bangladesh from Pakistan, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman argued that "without the inclusion of Assam the East Bengal economy could not be balanced". Does it indicate infiltration of Bangladeshi nationals in India is a planned long term annexation strategy of a newly born nation in 1971?

 

By looking at "Secularist Manifesto", it is not difficult to determine silence of "Secular" Indian media on this issue. Furthermore, why it is spreading disinformation regarding ongoing violence against natives of Assam. "Secular" Indian media is sleeping despite the fact that supreme court of India has termed this infiltration as "silent invasion" of Bangladeshi Muslims. This "Silent invasion" is now causing "ethnic" conflict with "religious" agenda on political sphere.

Developing situations in Assam.

The family channel of CNN-IBN  governed by @sagarikaghose and @sardesairajdeep came up with headlines "Assam violence death toll rises to 21, shoot-at-sight order issued". Without mentioning reasons for the riots in this excellent piece of journalism, press release (source: PTI) mentions "miscreants set ablaze a camp of the disbanded Bodoland Liberation Tigers", giving an impression that riots are part of a movement against state of India. To further confuse people reading this news in other parts of India, it further says "In Kokrajhar district, nearly 40,000 victims have taken shelter in 35 relief camps set up by the government, while more than 10,000 victims have themselves taken shelter in various schools and government offices in Chirang as the government has not opened any official relief camp, official sources said.". With such a large number of internal forced displacement, this confused master piece of journalism is liked by none and disliked by 9 fellows so far.

But above is assumed to be in continuation of previous reports. The same esteemed channel shows couple of more articles titled "Assam violence: Over 36,000 flee their homes","Assam riots: Toll reaches 19; fresh clashes on","Assam: Shoot-at-sight order issued in Kokrajhar". However, "The root cause of the communal violence still remains unexplained". Further it goes on to say "The trigger though took place in a village called Joypur on Friday where four people where hacked to death. After that attacks and counter attacks have spread like wildfire". But who attacked and who counter-attacked is still not clear. Surprisingly, "The AAMSU subsequently withdrew the bandh following an appeal by ministers". But  when did AAMSU gave a bandh call in the first place and what is legitimacy of AAMSU? It is clear from the news reports published on esteemed CNN-IBN that Bodos were at the receiving end - "An abandoned hostel of Bodo students was set ablaze at Bidyapara in Dhubri district with the fire brigade initially being prevented access before police intervened". Furthermore, was "camp of the disbanded Bodoland Liberation Tigers" actually "An abandoned hostel of Bodo students"?

The #InternetHindu were not satisfied with this confusion and looked at the foreign sources of news. Reuters reports that "India struggles to control deadly Assam riots, hamlets razed". In this report, some hints of what is going on in North-East India is available. Some communality mixed with lot of confusion has already mentioned in CNN-IBN reports but who is rioting?. The answer is, "Rioting between Bodo tribespeople and Muslim settlers has raged for days". The beginning of riot - "The violence reportedly erupted on Friday night when four youths of the Bodo tribe were killed by persons unknown -- in retaliation, armed Bodos attacked Muslims". If Muslims were settlers how they reached  near Bhutan border? where is the origin of these settlers? Here is the Answer from International Business Times. "in the eastern Indian state of Assam over the weekend in clashes between indigenous Assamese Bodo tribes and Muslim immigrants from neighboring Bangladesh". So Bangladeshi Muslims who infiltrated India, could settle near Bhutan border and the state administration is helpless in stopping it. By any chance, this infiltration poses a threat to local North-East tribal culture with "some 300 tribal and ethnic groups"? Where are Indian cultural programs on profit making privatized main stream media (MSM)? what efforts have been made for Indian cultural integration by MSM? But @sagarikaghosh of CNN-IBN will blame racism when ill-informed Indians interact with each-other.

Assam riot is not a small communal  problem as Indian media want #InternetHindus to believe. In the larger picture (favorite phrase of @bdutt), "India's Minister of State for Home Mullappally Ramachandran said last summer that almost 1.4 million illegal Bangladeshis have migrated to India over the past decade alone.Ramachandran described the illegal immigration from Bangladesh as a "big problem" and that the government is dealing with it". This is a symptom of much larger problem relating internal security of India.

Acknowledgements:

Author acknowledge all anonymous #InternetHindu community who tweeted on #AssamRiots