Chetia likely to be face of Ulfa peace deal

A day after Ulfa leader Anup Chetia was extradited from Bangladesh to India, the CBI presented him before a special court in New Delhi which gave a transit remand of six days so that the top Ulfa leader can be taken to Assam where several cases are pending against him.

While the Assam government has hinted that it is not going to drop cases against Chetia, sources hinted at a “fast track” process would be worked out to get Chetia out of legal tangles so that he can lead the pro-talk faction of the militant groups to close a tripartite peace deal, which has already reached an advance stage.

Sources in the Assam government confirmed to Deccan Herald that the state government would not drop any of the pending cases against Chetia and would go through the same legal process that other surrendered Ulfa leaders went through.

“The government also wants him to join the peace process. In fact, he is the right face to lead the (talks on) agreement. The government also sees him as an Ulfa leader who is equally important as much as Paresh Barua, at least in terms of image in upper Assam, the once Ulfa stronghold. He will be free after the court gives him bail. The state government would not interfere in the legal process,” a senior government official told Deccan Herald on condition of anonymity.

The state government may not challenge Chetia’s bail petition as it had done in the case of other top Ulfa leaders like the chairman of the pro-talk group Arabinda Rajkhowa and top leaders like Raju Baruah and Sashadhar Chowdhury.

Meanwhile, Chetia’s wife Monica Buragohain Baruah along with top criminal lawyer Bijon Mahajan left for New Delhi on Thursday.

Another Top Ulfa leader who is part of the pro-talk faction indicated that the Ulfa peace deal was more or less settled, the only contention was the demand of declaring six communities in Assam as Scheduled Tribes.

After facing humiliation in Bihar, the Bharatiya Janata  Party (BJP) is said to be brainstorming to rework its strategy for the 2016 Assembly polls in Assam, which it wants to poach from the ruling Congress.

Watchers believe Chetia’s extradition was the first step towards the BJP’s new plans to score brownie points in Assam.