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.