Social media got flooded with congratulatory posts in Assam’s Darrang district, particularly in the minority-dominated areas following the announcement of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) on 13 June 2023. Among the many qualified students, the success of two candidates assumes significance owing to the fact that their families and their parents’ fellow villagers were murdered on suspicion of being “illegal immigrants”.
Minhazul Abed Nannu and Sayed Nazibul obtained 565 and 589 marks respectively to qualify for the NEET test this year to pursue their dream of becoming a doctor. Both of them are descendants of victims of one the most brutal killings in Assam during the 1983 riots against Bengali Muslims.
They come from Chaulkhua Chapori. The Chapori (a low-lying flood plain area, where people live but not designated as a village) where Bengali-speaking Muslims live was encircled by a mob of Assamese nationalists on 14 February 1983 and chased villagers from 13 villages killing at least 190 people in a single day.
The unofficial count for the casualties was more than 500 at that time.
Nannu’s father, Kazimuddin Ahmed was happy for his son’s success in the coveted entrance exam. Surviving the horrific night and almost drowning while fleeing the mob on a hand boat to cross the Brahmaputra river, Ahmed was of the view that their second generation is proving their worth to the Assamese society by qualifying “some of the toughest exams in the country”.
“Everyone killed and living in Chaulkhuwa Chapori are Indian citizens. The whole massacre was targeted by a conspiracy that planned to exterminate everybody living in these villages. Now, you see, our children’s hard work and success are proving the point that their ancestors were not illegal immigrants,” said Kazimuddin.
Nazibul’s father, Sokman Ali Ahmed, moved to Mangaldai town, the district headquarter of Darrang when he was only 10 years old. Sokman said, “Everything was burning. The boat I was on while fleeing the village almost drowned. But we somehow got to the shore. Since then, we have worked really hard and 40 years down the line my son has qualified for NEET. Despite the burning of every institution, be it educational or religious, the people of Chaukhuwa rebuilt them. The perseverance has now borne fruit.”
It has been 40 years since the Chaulkhuwa Chapori massacre of Muslims in Assam and the place still remains “inaccessible and infrastructure, including educational, health, hygiene etc., extremely poor” as locals say.
Mojammil Hoque from Dhalpur village concurs with the parents of NEET-qualified students, “If there is more government intervention regarding roads, schools and health facilities many students from here would do very well. Two our own people qualified NEET, many would follow.”
While people in the Chapori, where 13 villages went through the pogrom, rejoiced the success of the two students, they also pointed out the “historical injustice meted out against the poor Muslims”.
The Settlers
The greater areas of Chaulkhuwa and Dhalpur, comprising a number of chars, are surrounded by the Brahmaputra river on the eastern and southern sides, and the northern sides are encircled by Nanoi River, a tributary of the Brahmaputra.
Fenced by waterbodies, the riverine sandbars are fertile and ideal for sustaining peasantry displaced by erosions. Following the 1950 massive earthquake in Assam, the Brahmaputra and its tributaries started changing course, eroding huge areas and displacing thousands of people.
“Due to the erosions, people from Morigaon, Kamrup, Barpeta and Goalpara districts started to settle down in Darrang district’s Chaulkuwa and Dhalpur chars in the 1960s. The people who live in riverine chars, their lives are decided by the flow of rivers. When one char submerges underwater, another sand island emerges. People navigate their lives accordingly”, says Saddam Hussein, who hails from nearby Kirakara village.
As eminent journalist and author Sanjay Hazarika pointed out in the much-appreciated book Rites of Passage about the ‘repatriation’ of Bangladeshi immigrants in the 1960s, the question of illegal immigration in Assam had long existed. In 1979, after the death of the MP from Mangaldoi Constituency, Hiralal Patowari, the election commission called for a customary revision of electoral rolls. This provided the state officers with a window to strike down the names of alleged foreigners on the voter lists.
From here, the anti-foreigner movement got the fuel and subsequently, the six-year-long agitation started. As part of the movement, the Muslim residents of Chaukhuwa Char were attacked and massacred by the Assamese ethnic nationalists.
“The people who were once murdered labelling them as Bangladeshis or bideshis, their descendants are proving their Indian nationality by cracking national level competitive exams. So, the question is, why were the people ruthlessly killed on mere suspicion of being foreigners without any investigation? If the blame is on an unruly mob, then why investigations have been suspended and for those who were killed, will there be justice for them? The NRC, the younger generation who are getting into government jobs or qualifying coveted national level exams are proving that those who were murdered were not Bangladeshis but Indian citizens butchered due to certain racial prejudices,” Saddam enquired into the labelling of ‘illegal foreigners’ of Muslims during Assam Agitation.
In the words of Mojammil, “The new generation is bringing the question back to the society by asserting their rights whether those killed in the name of being foreigners do not deserve enquiry into the killings? Whether their families, who have proved their citizenship, do not deserve the Constitutional remedies for justice?”.
