Giving the 1983 election-related violence in Assam, headlined by the Nellie massacre, a communal tag would be unwarranted, a panel formed more than four decades ago to probe one of the goriest chapters in the State’s history said.
The Commission, chaired by Tribhuvan Prasad Tewary, a retired IAS officer, held the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and the Asom Jatiyatabadi Yuva Chhatra Parishad (AJYCP) primarily responsible for launching the Assam Agitation and its consequences. It, however, said that the Assamese people’s fear of being outnumbered by outsiders was real and envisaged by British administrators much before the organisations spearheading the agitation were formed.
The anti-foreigners’ agitation was triggered in 1979 by the alleged entry of non-citizens, aka “Bangladeshis”, during the revision of electoral rolls for a by-election to the Mangaldoi Lok Sabha seat. The agitation ended when the Assam Accord was signed on August 15, 1985.
The agitation claimed several lives between 1979 and 1985, but the killings spiked during the controversial three-phase elections held in February 1983, when the State was under President’s Rule. According to the Tewary panel’s report, 3,023 people were killed across 11 districts between January 1 and April 30, 1983.
