Looking for India in Assam

During the past week, I had the great fortune to meet with about 50 school teachers from private and public schools in Assam to discuss issues of risk and safety.

Although the recent violence in Assam or its impact on the communities was not the focus of our discussion, a lot was said about the current crisis, in words that are seldom heard or read in the media.

That is rare in this age of ‘verbalizing’ ideas and insights into the print and electronic media, even before the full reality emerges. Articulation is replacing insightful reflection to an alarming degree in our society, where narration often preempts reality.

The teachers I met found that in the classrooms, the idea of India includes Assam, but only with extra effort. But similar efforts are not made, either by India or Assam, to include India into what is Assam. There is limited material available on this theme. In other words, in what ways, and why is the idea of India an integral part of being and becoming Assam? Since this question has not been asked now for over six decades, political and religious interests from inside and outside Assam are finding it easy to whip up thinking that not only separates the two ideas but also the people and their joint destiny. At least two generations have grown up without such integration of the two ideas.

Two history teachers pointed out that great nations are not made by merely overthrowing a ruler, by redrawing boundaries, or by setting up governance structures, however democratic such structures might be.

Great nations are not made overnight. On this count, India can do far more than it has done so far. We have relied on the thinking of our great leaders too much and for too long. There is no fresh thinking on who we are and where we are going, said the younger group of teachers. Television shows and ‘event-managed’ functions are hardly the tools that can build a great nation.

Several teachers noted that as a result of not embedding the idea of India within Assam, we are in effect separating Assam from India, or the people of the North East from the rest of India.

We tend to respond to crises but not to forces that cause them. Rajiv Gandhi’s Assam Accord brought a fresh air of hope; one poetic teacher described the air as “khusbhoo”. But how alive is the Accord today, either in physical reality or in spirit?

In this current crisis, one positive step would be for an independent team to take a few weeks to rate the performance of the Assam Accord and note areas where no or limited action was taken. This would have to be a Centre-State joint exercise, with Assam in the leading role; the findings would give the National Integration Council an opportunity for serious thought. Otherwise such Accords will languish, as we lose trust in our words and promises.

Policy paralysis on economic liberalisation causes many to speak up, the teachers noted, but poor performance on national integration over decades has attracted little public concern.

The same attention that the government and businesses have given to achieving a higher rate of GDP needs to be given to achieving greater national integration that is democratic, secular, and draws from India’s tradition of Bahudha: multiplicity. Several teachers had innovative ideas on how to go about promoting Bahudha in classrooms. They agreed that khushboo of India is starting to smell bad; but there is still time to open the windows and clear the air.

The author is head of All India Disaster Mitigation Institute and has worked in conflict areas. He can be reached at mihir@aidmi.org