Mamoni to continue with peace efforts

Notwithstanding her poor health, Dr. Mamoni Raisom Goswami will continue to do her bit towards bringing the banned ULFA to the negotiating table. At the same time, she will be busy writing a novel on the valiant Bodo woman, Thengphakri, the first woman revenue collector of Assam.

“My duty is to make the ULFA and the Government sit across the negotiating table, and beyond that I have no role… Everybody in Assam wants peace and there is no alternative to peace,” Dr. Goswami said at a press conference just before she was discharged from the Guwahati Neurological Research Centre (GNRC). Dr Goswami was admitted in the GNRC following a mild cerebral stroke. “She is almost cured now but will have to take a couple of weeks’ rest at home. She responded well to the treatment and made our task easier. Her mental faculty is intact,” Dr NC Borah, chairman-cum-managing director, GNRC, informed. But at the same time, she has been advised against donning the mantle of a negotiator for at least a couple of weeks. “She can resume activities like reading and writing immediately but should not subject herself to any stress or strain,” Dr. Borah said.

Dr Goswami opinedt that the State Government had a more important role to play in initiating the dialogue with the militants. “The ULFA had not called off the proposed talks, and the State Government has to take the first step and expedite the peace process,” she said, adding that the People’s Consultative Group (PCG), which had been formed to carry forward the peace initiative, would have a sitting at her home soon.

Dr Goswami felt that the restoration of peace in Assam needed sacrifice from all concerned. “Look how Mizoram became a peaceful State after a prolonged period of turmoil, mainly due to the sacrifice of Lalthanhawla,” she said.

On the creative front, the author said that she had been working on a novel based on Thengphakri, a much-neglected heroic figure of the British rule in India. “She was a great lady with immense courage and conviction but has not been given her due place in history. One of my aims of writing the novel is to bring her to focus in the right perspective,” she said. Dr Goswami said that she had already done much of the research work for the novel. “I have made several visits to Bijni in lower Assam, which is the backdrop of my novel. Thengphakri was the first woman revenue collector of Assam and she lived in the Bijni area,” she said.

PCPIA for resuming peace process

People’s Committee for Peace Initiatives in Assam (PCPIA), an umbrella body of 28 different organisations, has renewed its appeal to both the Government and the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) to suspend hostilities to create a congenial atmosphere to resume the peace process. The PCPIA members appealed in the interest of revival of the peace process to bring the ULFA to the negotiation table. PCPIA chief coordinator Dilip Patgiri informed that the Government has been making public its stand clear only through media and it should inform the ULFA formally about its requirements like a formal letter from the outfit. He said that the ULFA already made its stand clear that all communications from the Government should be sent formally through the People’s Consultative Group (PCG), formed by the outfit to hold initial parleys with the Government to pave the way for direct talks. Patgiri said that after the peace process ended in a deadlock last year, the PCG has not received any formal communication from the Government of India and the assurance of releasing five jailed central committee members of the ULFA was also not fulfilled.

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