A local court here has ordered the Assam police to file a case against Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on the basis of a complaint by Congress MP Abdul Khaleque. Khaleque had claimed that the CM made inflammatory remarks about an eviction drive conducted by the administration in Darrang district in Assam in September that had turned violent.
According to his lawyer, Shamim Ahmed Barbhuyan, the Congress MP moved the court after the Dispur police station failed to file an FIR against the Assam CM.
Following this, on Saturday, the court of Sub-Divisional Judicial Magistrate Biswadeep Baruah ordered the Dispur police station to file a case based on Khaleque’s allegation.
In the order, which was made available on Monday, the court said, “The O.C. Dispur P.S. is directed to register a case on the allegations mentioned in the complaint and investigate the matter fairly and to submit the Final Form at the earliest.”
In his complaint, the Congress MP had accused the chief minister of making anti-Muslim communal statements while justifying the eviction drive at Gorukhuti in September. The complaint sought the registration of an FIR against Sarma at the Dispur Police Station for offences under Sections 153 (wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot) and 153A (promoting enmity between different groups and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
“Betraying his oath on the Constitution, the Hon’ble Chief Minister Dr Sarma has maliciously given a communal colour to what was supposed to be an executive exercise,” the complaint said.
The “rampant human rights violations” at Gorukhuti were preceded by multiple utterances of Sarma, who targeted the particular community, Khaleque alleged.
“The hate created by the Hon’ble Chief Minister’s constant denigration of the Muslim community manifested itself in the egregious acts of a civilian,” he added.
Notably, the Congress MP had accused Sarma of hate-mongering and provoking people to commit “acts of rioting” against the state’s Muslim community. Referring to a part of the Chief Minister’s speech in Morigaon district on December 10, on the occasion of Swahid Divas (Martyrs’ Day), the Congress MP alleged that Sarma, in his speech, had stated that the eviction exercise at Gorukhuti in Darang district was an act of revenge for the incidents of 1983 – when some youths there were killed during the Assam Agitation.
Himanta Biswa Sarma slams Left, Congress and liberal Media accusing them of creating obstacles in protecting the identity of Assam
It may be noted that the Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma in a fiery speech given at the death anniversary of Khargeshwar Talukdar, the first martyr of the Assam Movement, slammed the liberal media for not covering the atrocities committed against the Assamese in the past.
Assam Chief Minister also raised questions if Assamese people feel safe in the state, ‘like the situation we were in 1979, even in 2021 we are not in any better position’. He said that all those people who had weakened the Assamese Movement in 1979, were involved in repeating the same things all over again and weakening the position of the state by assuming a different shape. Sarma then blamed the ‘leftists’ for crippling the Assam Movement in the past and stated that the same forces were involved even today in destabilizing the Assamese culture.
Assam CM then further stated that the ‘leftists’ and Congress party fueled the rise of the political party AIUDF in the state in order to politically weaken the Assamese. Sarma also mentioned the killing of young men of Assam in Gorukhuti and how the liberal media covered up the atrocities committed there ‘..There was a 4000 years old temple in Gorukhuti, and the priest of that temple was brutally killed and the wife of the priest was forcefully converted…’
The CM accused the media of distorting the recent events in Garukhuti, where an eviction drive had faced violent protests.
Assam CM issued the statement after the eviction drive in Assam turned violent
On September 23 an eviction drive conducted by the administration in Darrang district in Assam had turned violent after illegal encroachers of the land attacked security forces. While 9 policemen were injured in the attack by the mob of illegal encroachers, 2 attackers were killed in retaliatory police firing.
The incident took place at the Dholpur in the Garukhuti area near the Sipajhar town in Darrang district in Assam, where the Himanta Biswa Sarma government is conducting an eviction drive of illegal settlers on land belonging to the government or other organisations like temples. When the eviction party reached the place inhabited by Bengali speaking Muslims on Thursday, thousands of people clashed with the police, attacking them with stones, machetes, pointed bamboo sticks etc.
