Revisiting Nellie: Two reports on 1983 Assam massacre made public

Guwahati: Was the “imposition” of the Assembly elections in Assam in 1983, amid the anti-foreigners movement, the sole reason behind the massacre of over 2,000 people — including more than 1,800 “immigrant Muslims” — in just seven hours at Nellie?

Two inquiry committees, one set up by the government and another by agitators and freedom fighters (Asom Rajyik Mukti-Jujaru Sanmilan, a forum of freedom fighters in Assam who had fought against the British), released reports that offered contradictory observations. The reports were made public after 42 years on Tuesday.

The Tribhuvan Prasad Tewari Commission of Inquiry on the Assam Disturbances, 1983, concluded that the decision to hold the elections could not be blamed for the outbreak of violence. Tewari, an IAS officer, had submitted his 559-page report in May 1984, when the Congress was in power.

The “non-government Judicial Inquiry Commission” headed by TU Mehta, a retired Chief Justice of the Himachal Pradesh High Court, observed that the “imposition” of elections against the wishes of the people was one of the main reasons behind the large-scale violence in 1983. The Mehta Commission submitted its report in January 1985, but it was not accepted by the government.

In contrast, the Tewari Commission report argued that long-standing tensions over land, identity, migration and representation had created a volatile climate. “The evidence produced before the commission clearly brings out that the issues of foreigners, language, etc. have been agitating the minds of the people for the last several decades, exploding into violence on several previous occasions,” the report concluded. It cited incidents of violence in 1950, 1954, 1960, 1968, 1972, 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980, 1981 and 1982, noting that “most of these disturbances were not related to elections”.

The All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), the All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad and other groups had called for a boycott of the 1983 Assembly elections after the Centre rejected their demand to scrutinise electoral rolls and remove the names of “foreigners”. This led many to believe that the “imposition” of the elections was the main reason behind the violence, including the massacre at Nellie on February 18, 1983.

The Tewari Commission, however, was boycotted by the agitators. Its report was tabled in the Assembly by the Prafulla Kumar Mahanta-led Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) government after it came to power in 1985, but copies were not made available. Subsequent governments also withheld the report, citing the sensitive nature of the cases.

‘Senseless violence’

The Tewari Commission report concluded that all sections of society suffered as a result of the “senseless violence”.

“In some places, the attackers were Assamese and in others, the victims were Bengali-speaking people, both Hindus and Muslims. In certain other places, Muslims were the attackers and the Assamese were the victims. In several areas, the clashes took place between various sections of the Assamese,” the report noted.

Both reports, however, pointed to the growing fear and anger over demographic changes caused by “large-scale illegal migration” from the erstwhile East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) as a key factor that culminated in the violence.