GUWAHATI: BJP national president JP Nadda on Monday said the Narendra Modi government had protected Assam’s territorial integrity as it solved the Bodo agitation for a separate state.
“The Bodo agitation had been going on for 50 years. Over 4,000 lives were lost. But after the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) Accord was signed (in January 2020), all groups of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland laid down weapons. In bringing them to the mainstream, the NDA government-protected Assam’s territorial integrity,” Nadda told a crowd kicking off the BJP’s Assam poll campaign in Silchar.
He made mention of the Rs 1,500 crore package which the Centre will give for the development of Bodo areas. The package was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Bodo heartland Kokrajhar in February last year.
Nadda said the BJP was performing its responsibility to protect Assam’s existence, language, and culture. If any party is sensitive to the rights of Assam’s indigenous people, it is the BJP, he asserted.
“If anyone raised his voice to make the Assam Agitation a country-wide movement, it was Bharat Ratna Atal Behari Vajpayee. He raised his voice inside and outside the Parliament,” the BJP president said.
He also said that the BJP had stood all along by the agitation. The six-year-long bloody agitation had ended with the signing of the historic Assam Accord between the then Rajiv Gandhi government and the All Assam Students’ Union in 1985. As per the accord, the immigrants, who entered the state after March 24 (midnight), 1971 have to be detected and deported.
“It is the NDA that recognised Assam’s culture and existence. Assam has got a beautiful language. Protecting it is the responsibility of all of us. We have done our part,” Nadda asserted.
He said the problem of the displaced Brus of Mizoram continued for too long until the Modi government had solved it through its decision to rehabilitate 36,000 people.
“During UPA, Assam received Rs 50,000 crore for development. The NDA gave the state Rs 3 lakh crore. We finished many unfinished projects of the Congress,” Nadda said, adding, “The work for All India Institute of Medical Science in Guwahati is going on. It will be a world-class hospital. Once it becomes
operational, people will not be required to go to Delhi or Kolkata. They will get treatment here.”
Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, who also spoke, pointed out that Assam remained peaceful under the BJP. “There was no violence in the state over the past five years under the BJP government. This is sabka saath, sabka vikash,” he interpreted the BJP narrative.