Official website of Govt. of Assam - Public Information Officers (Union Govt.) - Public Information Officers (Indian Parliament) - Central Information Commission (CIC) - Directorate of Information & Public Relations Govt. Of Assam

RTI Acts & Rules - RTI User's Guide - RTI Acts 2005, FAQ (in Assamese) - RTI Acts 2005, Main Characteristics (in Assamese)

Third Eye
Students for Social Resurgence: By: R.S. Mooshahary

Students are the greatest youth force of any society and in it are contained the seeds of the future of a nation. As the youth is, so will be the future of a society. Therefore, the public, especially the enlightened segment, has the responsibility to mould the youth with examples of personal probity and forthrightness and inculcate in them the spirit of service, sacrifice and tolerance. The youth too must learn to emulate the good and ignore the ignoble, listen to the learned, and remove the chaff from the grain.

Restlessness is to youth as the wave is to ocean. Increasingly the youth is asserting to play the lead role and take up issues, which they consider require them to provide the right direction. in this context, Assam has the unique distinction of experiencing the organized students’ movements for nearly three decades influencing the State’s course of history and the destiny of its people. They have become the rallying points in many issues of importance having a bearing on the lives of people.

The All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and the All Bodo Students’ Union (ABSU) are two powerful youth bodies, which have been spearheading relentlessly, and in great strength , various issues in the State with the objectives to influence the course of events. They have wide network of activities and huge cadres and resources to sustain their endeavours. There is no doubt that these students’ organizations have the best interest of the society in view in whatever they are doing and to that extent, they deserve to be encouraged to carry on with their agenda.

Many responsible people, however, have expressed their concern that the students’ organizations – especially the AASU – have created more problems than they have been able to resolve, through their organizational back-ups, in the State. They are unhappy that student politics has caused fissures in the ones – fascinating social landscape of the State and given rise to ethnic animosity as never seen before. It is also a matter of grave concern that the moral standards of the youth are declining in inverse proportion on the students’ involvement in the affairs of the State – that the students are making quick material gains using the influence and resources of the organization without accountability.

From late 1970s to mid – 1980s, Assam witnessed a never-seen-before mass upsurge against the foreigners under the students’ initiative. The student leaders become iconic figures and the entire Brahmaputra valley spontaneously responded to their calls for supporting launching various forms of civil disobedience programmes for expelling the foreigners from the soil of Assam. It culminated in the signing of the Assam Accord in 1985 and the student leaders formed the government, raising the hope of the people for a new Assam where progress and prosperity, equity and unity, and honesty and integrity would form the hallmark of the State. Sadly, it was not to be and soon the fissiparous forces raised their heads. Foreigners continued to stay and ethnic groups felt the sense of alienation in their own State, thereby spawning more students’ organizations in competition with the AASU. The worst was that a section of the youth leaders got so disillusioned with the inability of youth politics to fulfill the public aspirations that they formed a militant organization – the ULFA. Soon it became the harbinger of more such militant organizations with the agenda for establishing their own ethnic identities in separate geographical area. Thus the armed struggle originated in the wake of youth dominance of the political stage. The State literally became a plundering pad of both the over ground and the underground operators in that chaotic milieu.

This situation unfortunately is gaining ground even more with militancy, extortion and corruption making a mockery of democratic polity and governance through the rule of law. It will be, of course, unfair to blame the students’ bodies for all the ills and distortions that are afflicting the State. May be they have contributed to these crises without designs and despite the best of intentions. It is also a fact that the youth is learning from seniors the skill of power politics reeked in corruption, exploitation and self – aggrandizement.

Things are moving fast in time and clime, and even to stand where we are in the present, we need to move faster lest others who are on the move overtake us in our journey to progress and prosperity. For the AASU, however, the Assam Accord is still the search engine for answer to present problems. In 2007, they continue to negotiate the issues raised 22 years ago without changing the strategy. So much of resources, sacrifices and efforts have gone down the drain in trying to make the Assam Accord transform Assam that if they were to flow through the Brahmaputra, it would have been like the inundating waters after having summer showers that sweep of the scum and wastes making the environment cleaner and healthier.


The important contents of the Accord – the deportation of the foreigners and the constitutional safeguards for the Assamese – are still non starters. Even the simple issue of revival of Jogighopa paper mill has not materialized despite many assurances by the authorities. Experience and prudence should have guided them to formulate new approaches to resolve the lingering problems; that some things are important from the emotional angle but others from the existential imperatives. The unpalatable truth is that through the issues which the AASU is spearheading are important the strategy for attaining them has proven to be ineffectual. It is time the AASU redefined their programmes for devising newer means to get the desired ends and prioritized targets with the objectives to empower the people to eradicate the ills that are afflicting the people and the State to no end.

A visionary approach with open hearts and clearer heads to conceptualize a new paradigm, which has to be more inclusive of the plurality of population, is the need of the time. The cornucopia of diverse castes, creeds, cultures, customs, customs and cuisines is the soul and breath of Assam. No monolithic edifice of one group or the other should overshadow it. We can deport foreigners, define Assamese through cohesive efforts, and build new paper mills by creating peaceful conditions essential for industrial investments – while the present condition is not even congenial for the revival of an old paper mill gone defunct years ago. The bandhs extortion, corruption and lack of infrastructure are the antidotes to peace, progress and security, and the implementation of the Assam Accord will not change the ground reality in the absence of socially inclusive programmes.

The students can set many things right and yet they can also meddle and mess up many things. There are issues, which are of concern to all requiring vigorous pursuits and the students’ involvement in them can create waves of resurgence for unifying the polyglot society. If they really want to serve the state and promote trust and goodwill, they should take up programmes like combating corruption, superstition, extortion, illiteracy and all types of inequities and exploitation that are the root causes of unrest, violence and backwardness. These are issues affecting everyone, and regardless of the caste, creed, religion or political affiliations, people will come forward to identify with the struggles against these evils.

Students can play the primordial role in social transformation through spread of literacy and awareness across the state by virtue of their widespread presence. It is inexplicable why the AASU or the ABSU has not launched concerted fight to eradicate corruption – the cancer in the society – through the application of the Right to Information Act, which is the most affective and people – friendly legislation for creating accountability in governance, or why they do not oppose the frequent bandhs or extortions so prevalent in the state. Assam is nor marching ahead along the path to progress not because we have not been able to define the term “Assamese”, deport the foreigners, or reopen some paper mill, but the corruption, explosion, extortion and frequent breakdown of law and order have paralysed it for long. Let the students take up the challenge to rid the State of these debilities and create a climate of peace, progress and well-being. Then the issues, which are more emotive and which have eluded solution, may get resolved in the true historical perspective.

(THIRD EYE is a fortnightly column by Ranjit S. Mooshahary, exclusively for The Sentinel. Mooshahary is a former Director General of the Border Security Force and the National Security Guards. He is currently Chief Information Commissioner, Asom)