In search of Sanjoy
-Sumita Ghose

The Brahmaputra Mail pulled into Guwahati station eighteen hours behind the scheduled time. This is not very unusual for this train, and for most others going to Assam. All trains, going north eastwards, except maybe the Rajdhani, receive the least priority, and it is only a miracle which enables a train to reach on time! And if a train is anywhere near reaching on schedule, some militant group is bound to have blown up a track somewhere!

But then, maybe our reaching late was a blessing in disguise; we reached just as night was giving way to day, and the first hues of reddish orange were touching up the sky. A brand new day, a new beginning, a good omen, I thought to myself.

We were fifty of us making this journey in search of Sanjoy. We did not believe the lies that ULFA was putting out regarding Sanjoy's condition, especially the story that he had fallen off a cliff and died, while trying to escape. All of us who had lived and worked closely with Sanjoy, certainly knew that this could not be possible. Sanjoy has always been one who faces up to and tackles challenges with a mission. Running away from problems was certainly not his style of functioning. And besides, if such an incident had indeed taken place, why was the ULFA not divulging the site of this supposed accident?

After waiting for a year, for the ULFA to have the decency to tell us the truth, and for the government to come up with results of investigations, we decided to undertake a journey ourselves, and request the people of Assam to help us in our search for Sanjoy, for the truth and for justice.

An informal group of people, friends of Sanjoy, had come togeter spontaneously, in order to make coordinated efforts to search for Sanjoy. The core group was based in Delhi, but support came from all over the country, as well as from abroad. Friends of Sanjoy, organised a rally a few days after the ULFA statement to the press that ‘Sanjoy had fallen off a cliff in Arunachal Pradesh, and died, and they were unable to find his body’. The rally in Delhi, from Rajghat to Jantar Mantar was attended hundreds of people who were shocked at the callousness of the ULFA, a group claiming to fight for the ‘liberation’ of Assam. A memoandum was also handed over to the speaker of the Lok Sabha, demanding inquiry and prompt action. On September 4 a demonstration was organised outside Assam Bhavan, where musicians, artists and other concerned people sang songs for peace, submited a memorandum, signed by all present, to demand Sanjoy's release.

On December 4, a press conference was organised to highlight the issue and point out the various discrepancies in the statements of both, the ULFA as well as the government, and the need to get to the truth. On December 7, apeace concert was organised on the occasion of Sanjoy's birthday, near Qutab Minar.

Public meetings, press conference, marches, rallies, and candlelight demonstrations were oganised in other parts of the country — Ahmedabad, Bhubaneshwar, Jaipur, Bikaner, Mumbai and Bangalore.

In Assam, especially in Majuli and Guwahati, there were many protests and condemnations of the ULFA's actions, in the period immediately following Sanjoy's abduction and his 'falling off the cliff'. It was probably the first time that so many people and organisations strongly and openly condemned the ULFA, and raised their voices against violence.

Our team, AVARD-NE, was forced to leave Assam towards the end of July 1997, in exchange for Sanjoy's release. Althouh physically many hundred miles away, my mind, heart and spirit, continued to remain in Assam. It was, and continues to be a traumatic period for all, a state under siege. In far away Delhi, our only source of information was the media. Ganga, my friend and colleague from our years together in URMUL in Lunkaransar, told me how people in villages asked for loans to buy radios, in order to get news about Sanjoy. I would scan the newspapers every morning, with a one track mind — what news from Assam? And suddenly — or was it just that I was looking for it? Assam seemed to be in the news virtually every day. From capturing of ULFA cadres, encounter deaths, protests by people, the chief minister’s numerous trips to New Delhi, requesting financial and other help to the clashes between different extremist grops, the trouble in the Bodo areas, the bandhs unfailingly called on Independence and Repubic days, the blowing up of oil pipelines, the arrest of the ULFA cultural secretary, Prana Deka in Mumbai, which brought to light startling revelations about the pay-offs being made by large and small business houses to the ULFA and the NDFB; the lavish lifestyles of ULFA leaders, the camps in Bangladesh and Bhutan, the arrest of ULFA leaders Anup Chetia in Dhaka and Pradeep Gogoi in Calcutta, the fodder scam, the tenuous position of the chief minister whose leadership was challenged several times, the stories seem to just pour out....

Of course, I took all this news with a pinch of salt, realising that all that comes out in print is not necessarily based on fact, and that the media in Assam, like in the rest of the country, is not always driven by its role as information-provider and conscience-keeper. In keeping with the current trends of commercialisation and commodification, they will publish with the primary motive of ‘profit maximisation’. Gossip, rumour and scandals sell like nothing else. This I had learned the bitter way, having had to stomach several gory stories relating to Sanjoy's fate. None based on any factual evidence, but on hearsay and anonymous letters, and ‘leaks’, which some newspapers seemed only too eager to publish.

Different groups were pushing their own pet theories regarding Sanjoy's fate. While the Assam police seemed very desperate to establish that Sanjoy was killed on the day of his abduction, the ULFA kept maintaining that ‘he fell off a cliff and died’, a month later. As for the government at the Centre, both the United Front and the BJP with its allies, with its mammoth infrastructure, including its various snoop agencies, were unable to find out anything about Sanjoy's well being and whereabouts. Or so they told us. From time to time, all of them fed stories to the press, in order to try and give credibility to their versions. And of course the fouth estate was only too willing to oblige. The more gruesome and sordid the better, and with some gossip thrown in for good measure.

One such example is the ‘skeleton story’. Sometime in early May 1998, there was a story — front page in most papers — that a skeleton, had been found north of Majuli, near Lakhimpur district, by some labourers digging the land. The police officer under whose jurisdiction the area fell, immediately went to the press claiming that Sanjoy's skeleton had been found, and that it was being sent for DNA testing! After the initial shock, I collected myself. Questions immediately came to my mind, raising doubts. The point where the police had earlier claimed that Sanjoy had been killed was in nowhere near the place from where the skeleton had been recovered. It was not possible for it to have floated upstream either! We got calls from newspaper correspondents in Guwahati, asking for my opinion, and wanting to know if Sanjoy's parents were going for the DNA tests. They had no bothered to brush up on the geography of their own state, nor get some basic understanding of forensic science. The latter would have educated them on the fact that, such as determining the approximate age, sex, and the approximate time of death of the skeleton is sought.

When I told them that I did not believe that the skeleton had anything to do with Sanjoy, they wanted to know if I had access to any ‘secret information’ which made me so certain! Of course, subsequently, there were statements by the police, saying that the skeleton had nothing to do with Sanjoy.

But gradually with the passing of time, people in Assam seemed to have accepted the ULFA statements, and they began looking at the whole issue in the past tense. This for us, was certainly not acceptable. By giving up, the public was letting the ULFA get away with merely issuing lies to the newspapers. And what about the government's responsibility of ensuring law and order, and bringing culprits to book? We felt very strongly, that it was precisely this kind of acceptance and inaction which gave the perpetrators of violence the gall to continue their nefarious activities. So we decided it was time to make a trip to Assam, and continue reiterating our stand for the truth.

Although we had begun preparing for this journey quite a few months in advance, we were not at all sure as to how it would eventually turn out and what shape our protest would take. The North East, and especially Assam, seemed to be in a state of siege, and turmoil, with reports of killings, scams, pay-offs and floods dominating the newspapers. While we wanted to raise certain questions, in our search for the truth, we were also concerned about not adding to the confusion. The challenge before us was to put forth our concerns in a constructive manner. Yes, our main purpose was to find Sanjoy, and not be content with the lame reasons given both by the ULFA as well as the state for his disappearance, to seek the help of the people of Assam in
our search. What we wanted to bring to the attention of people was that linked to Sanjoy's abduction and subsequent disappearance were the fundamental issues of the right to voice one's opinion on the prevailing state of affairs and the right to work in any part of the country without fear of intimidation.

The reactions from people in Assam, as they received our call to join in the rallies in Majuli and Guwahati were mixed. A few, very few in fact, offered wholehearted support. By and large, the response was hesitant, uneasy. There were doubts raised: why should we condemn the government, after all hadn't they done all they could? Would this step provide an excuse to the ‘believers in violence’ to group together again?

Our proposed actions were seen as a kind of a challenge, and the fear was that it might add to the existing violence and uncertainty. There was also the oft-repeated grouse — Oh, you are making plans in Delhi, and expecting us to join in! It seemed that any ‘activism’ on the issue was best avoided. On the whole, this reaction was due to inability to understand the reasons behind our proposed visit.

Some felt that we were mad, and that this was the reaction of a wife, who was refusing to come to terms with the ‘truth’. Then there were others who thought that we had devious intentions and that we were ‘conspiring with the state’ to put down the ‘revolution for the liberation of the Assamese people’!

(Excerpted with permission from Sanjoy's Assam, edited by Sumita Ghose and published by Penguin Books, India)