Assam erupts in rage over #CitizenshipAmendmentBill. BJP offices are being attacked. Posters of Narendra Modi and Sarbananda Sonowal have been torn and their effigies burnt. Police have lathicharged, fired tear gas and rubber bullets. Slogans of "BJP go back" are being raised.
Looking at people through the prism of Hindutva is what will prove to be BJP's undoing, as the situation in Assam has shown right now. Religion can never be a binding factor. If you didn't learn that from Pakistan breaking into two countries, you will never get it. #BharatBandh
Did you know that there have been many instances of students from colleges dropping out and joining ULFA just because of this #CitizenshipAmendmentBill? Did you know how long it took to end the insurgency there? And do you realise that what was dead is being resurrected now?
As in everywhere else, there will always be some people in Assam who will fall for communal propaganda. But there will always be a vast majority that will reject Hindutva because of the inherently pluralistic nature of Assamese society that harbours no hate for minority faiths.
Last year, during Durga Puja, some Hindutva forces had started illegally constructing a North-India style Ram temple within the historic Shiva Doul complex. The Assamese people chased those people away and razed the structure. Where else in India is something like that possible?
A serious advice to the political class: do not try to turn the clock backwards. The state came out of the grip of insurgency after suffering a lot. Don't drag it back to the 1980s and 1990s. People want a future. A better future. Work towards giving them that. Not this.
