There appears to be a contradiction between the comments made by the All Bodo Students’ Union (ABSU) president Dipen Boro to this newspaper, and the report which had appeared about those of Union Home Minister Amit Shah while speaking as the chief guest at the 57th annual conference of the ABSU held in Assam’s Kokrajhar last March.
On that occasion, attended by Assam’s Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, State Assembly Speaker Biswajit Daimary, Bodoland Territorial Council Chief Executive Member Pramod Boro, Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan, Intelligence Bureau (IB) Director Tapan Deka, Shah had explicitly stated that 80 percent of the conditions outlined in the third Bodo Accord, signed in 2020, have been fulfilled by the Centre, with the remaining conditions were set to be met within the next two years.
On the other hand, as Dipen Boro has asserted to this newspaper, the ABSU is set to launch a democratic movement if all the clauses of the Peace Accord signed in January 2020 with all four factions of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) are not implemented by the end of this year. According to him, in a review meeting on the implementation of the Accord recently held with representatives of the Ministry of Home Affairs and the State government, the ABSU had made this stand clear, threatening to launch a movement if all the clauses are not implemented within 2025.
One of the ABSU’s demands had been that Article 280 of the Constitution of India should be amended to give more power to the Bodoland Territorial Council and to create a Finance Commission for the BTC. He said that if this were done, the Council would be able to get funds directly from the Central government without routing the same through the State government. He complained that another provision of the Accord, increasing the number of constituencies in BTC from 40 to 60, is yet to be implemented, 300 more villages in Biswanath and Sonitpur districts remain to be included, while the anti-defection law has not been made applicable in the Council.
Moreover, major Accord points, giving ST Hills status to the Bodo Kacharis living in Karbi Anglong, creation of Bodo Kachari Autonomous Council outside of the BTR, and implementation of the Forest Rights Act, 2006, are yet to be implemented and the State and Central governments are yet to initiate any step in this regard. Similarly, as per the Accord, the government had assured to withdraw the cases against NDFB members and recruit members of the outfit in the Central paramilitary forces, but that has not yet been done. Since Boro has threatened that the ABSU would launch a movement if these and some other demands are not fulfilled within this year, the Centre would do well to clarify the contradiction between the ABSU’s assertions and those of Shah.