Politics / Assam

NEW DELHI, May 7 ? Reiterating Centre?s conditional offer for talks with the outlawed ULFA, Union Minister of State for Home, I D Swami today while ruling out the possibility of unilateral ceasefire said the offer has to come from the militant outfit. Talking to a group of newsmen on the sidelines of the national seminar organized by All Assam Students Union (AASU), the Minister said the outfit has to first abjure violence and give up arms before negotiations. ?It is the first stated policy of the Government of India to talk to any militant outfit provided they give up violence,? he said.

On...

GUWAHATI, May 5 ? The size of migration of people to Assam between 1951 and 1991 was 28,75,492 and of this, the size of the illegal foreign migrants to the State, during the period, was 12,98,754. This was revealed by a study conducted by the Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development (OKDISCD) here. The study entitled ?Migration to Assam : 1951-1991?, was conducted by a team of experts comprising Prof Atul Goswami, Prof Homeswar Goswami and Dr Anil Saikia on behalf of the OKDISCD. The study, however, revealed that during the said period the estimated number of total foreign...

GUWAHATI, May 4 ? Mising Ba:ne Kebang, the apex council of the Mising people of Assam and Arunachal, which remained defunct since 1994 after the Bilmukh incident, has been revived by Mising people at a special convention held on April 27 and 28 at Gogamukh in Dhemaji district. Mising Ba:ne Kebang is the oldest and largest organisation of the Mising people and was formed in the pre-independence period in 1924 under the presidentship of Sri Sri Pitambar Dev Goswami, the Satradhikar of Gormur Satra. Eminent persons of Assam like English Officer Tolstoy, ex-Chief Minister late Sir Sadullah, late...

NEW DELHI, May 3 ? Under pressure to act fast to resolve the Bodo tangle, the Union and Assam Government today decided to jointly draft the modifications to the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution envisaging safeguards of the non-Bodos in the proposed Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC). The first meeting at the political level on the Bodo issue between Chief Minister, Tarun Gogoi and Union Home Minister, LK Advani was used by Assam Government to clarify its position on creation of BTC and the amendments to the Sixth Schedule aimed at protection of the non-Bodos.

An official-level committee...

GUWAHATI, May 2 ?The Assam Agricultural University and colleges under the varisty have been closed down for an indefinite period from 6 pm today followeing vandalism by a group of students. The varsity authorities also asked the students to vacate their hostels immediately in order to maintain peace in the campus. A university release said that the students forcefully entered the chamber of the Vice-Chanchellar (VC) about 10.30 am today, snapped all telephone connections and started shouting slogans demanding resignation of the VC and relieving Dr P C Deka from the post of Dean. To...

NEW DELHI, April 30? Several Bodo and non-Bodo organisations under the banner of Coordination Committee for Bodoland Movement (CCBM) today called on the BJP national president, Jana Krishnamurthy urging him to prevail on the Central Government to expedite the creation of Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC). A delegation of the CCBM spearheaded by All Bodo Students Union (ABSU) is currently in the capital to press for solution of the Bodo problem.

A spokesman of the CCBM told this newspaper that the delegation comprising representatives of Bengali, Adivasi, Nepali, Muslim, Rajbongshi...

GUWAHATI, April 29 ? Nalbari district, a strong bastion of the proscribed United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), is today under siege of the Army, police and para-military forces engaged in counter-insurgency operation. Deputy Commissioner of Nalbari, B Kalyan Chakraborty, who heads the Unified Command at district level by virture of his official position, informed that over 20 hardcore ULFA militants had been ?eliminated? in the district in ?encounters? with security forces in the last couple of months. The Deputy Commissioner attributed the success of ?well-coordinated? Army-police...

GUWAHATI, April 28 ? Police today registered a case against a group of trouble-makers allegedly led by ruling party MLA of Sootea constituency Praneswar Basumatary after they had set fire to an anti-poaching camp at Ranggajan Chapori inside Nameri National Park in Sonitpur district this morning. A case against the group, including the MLA, has been registered in Rangapara police station under Section 147/148/149/353/447/436 & 506 of IPC on the basis of FIR lodged by forest department staff in Nameri Park.

Meanwhile, in a press release, Aaranyak, a frontline bio-diversity conservation society...

GUWAHATI, April 25 : The proscribed United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) has expressed its ?grave concern? over mounting tension and mistrust among different communities in the State over proposed Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC). Dismissing the reported allegation of Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT) publicity secretary, Mainao Daimari who stated that ULFA was trying to create confusion among Bodo people over BTC and conspiring to deprive Bodo people of their democratic right, the banned ULFA in a statement today said that the BLT leader made the ?sweeping remarks? in the media without reading...

GUWAHATI, April 25 ? The Assam Police, under the Project Aashwas, will soon launch a baseline survey of the trauma and requirements of the families of the victims of terrorism. Police sources said that a reputed agency has already been engaged to carry out the survey and the project will be financed by the UNICEF. Sources pointed out that so far no scientific survey of the trauma and needs of the victims of terrorism was carried out in the State. The survey will take at least a year.

The second component of the project, that is training of police personnel and other officials to change their...