Polling prospects

There is no reason to think that the polls to the 13th Lok Sabha in Assam would be adversely affected by election boycott call by any extremist outfit. This is the conclusion arrived at through an opinion poll conducted in the Guwahati Lok Sabha constituency by the students of the Institute of Mass Communication and Media run at Guwahati by the Celebration Committee of the 150 years of newspapers in Assam. The first sample survey of its kind done by students of the Institute as part of their course leading to the post-graduate diploma in Journalism and Mass Communication covered a random sample of 544 voters, with an error margin of one per cent. Some of the interesting conclusions from this survey are: about 87 per cent of the respondents said they would cast their votes this time with 77 per cent of them saying that the poll boycott calls are not justified. However, the six per cent of respondents who said they would not cast their votes, it was not fear but the "bad past experience" which was cited as the reason. That the electorate wants political stability is proved by the fact that 86 per cent of respondents considered it a must. Interestingly, 48 per cent of respondents were unsure whether the 13th Lok Sabha would last is full term, while 38 per cent expected the new Lok Sabha would complete its full term. Another significant fact is that 47 per cent said they would vote according to the preference for the party while 28 per cent said they would vote for the individual.

Regarding the qualities they expect from the MP, 25 per cent said they were for one who would work for the State, 20 per cent said they would look for efficiency and honesty, 18 per cent said they wanted someone whose voice would be heard in the Lok Sabha and 17 per cent said they would go for the personality of the candidate. As expected, the unemployment problem deserved to be highlighted by the MP as per the view of 24 per cent while other issues like insurgency, infiltration, floods, lack of infrastructure, etc. also figured prominently in the list of priorities. Of the 544 respondents, 75 per cent belonged to the urban areas, 79 per cent of them being males. An overwhelming 63 per cent of the respondents were in the 18 to 35 age group with 20 per cent being between 35 and 45. Among the people surveyed were students (13%), government employees (20%) , private service (15%), self employed (22%), businessmen (15%), professionals (3%), farmers (1%), daily wage earners (3%) and housewives (6%). About 54 per cent of respondents had post-Matric or graduate qualifications, 17 per cent were post-graduates and above.

This sample survey is the first of its kind in Assam and that too conducted by an institute devoted to promotion of learning of journalism and mass media. Giving allowance for marginal error of say one or two per cent, it can be safely concluded that the voters in Assam would exercise their franchise in the ensuing polls. Unlike the Lok Sabha polls of early 1998, the Lok Sabha elections this time would be better participated as people are overcoming fears, apprehensions and even threats. At the same time there is undoubtedly an element of frustration and disappointment among a section of the electorate (6 per cent in the present survey) who do not feel attracted to cast their votes. Their disinclination stems from their progressive disillusionment with the candidates and the parties they had supported or felt attracted to support earlier. Therefore, the political parties and the candidates have a positive role to play in restoring the faith of the voters in polls. Otherwise, there is an inherent danger that not the threat from extremist outfits but the inner alienation of the voters would render the electoral exercise less than meaningful.

The Assam Tribune

Burying our future

As the historian, Sir Edward Gait, had pointed out in his A History of Assam, historical monuments in the Brahmaputra Valley do not stand a chance of surviving for too long. He cited alluvial soil, the shifting, oscillating courses of the rivers, frequent earthquakes, as well as man-induced vandalism like that perpetrated by the iconoclast Kala Pahar, to be some of the causes. This is why, despite Assam having a glorious past which included mighty kingdoms like Pragjyotisha of the Asura dynasty of Narakasura and Bhagadatta, empires of Bhaskarvarman, Salastambha, Naranarayan et al, so few memorials of their times have come down to us. No doubt much of this past is enshrined in folk-lore and mythology, but these hardly make for credible, authentic history. The lack of surviving memorials can be gauged from the fact that the earliest historical relics in the valley, the Umachala rock-inscription, go back only to the 5th century AD. In fact epigraphical material such as rock-inscriptions and copper-plates, due to their relative longevity, constitute much of the evidence upon which to reconstruct our history before the coming of the Ahoms. As is well known, only from the 13th century do we have recorded history, thanks primarily to the meticulously maintained Ahom Buranjis. No doubt ruins of medieval temples and cities offer glimpses of history prior to the Ahom period, and qualified archaeologists can conjecture a great deal from sites like Surya Pahar, Bhismak Nagar, Pancharatna, Jogighopa, Da Parbatiya, Deopani, Deo Parbat, etc. But these are more of academic interest and the layman as also the tourist would be more attracted towards those relics which have withstood the test of time. The paucity of memorials makes it imperative that we cherish what we have and do our best to preserve the heritage of our history. It is in this context that the detailed report which appeared in this newspaper about encroachment on archaeologically important sites in the Sivasagar area is so alarming. It seems that some individuals, in connivance with unscrupulous officials of the State Revenue Department, are grabbing land upon which historical monuments are standing. Many of these monuments, such as Rang Ghar, Kareng Ghar, Talatal Ghar and Phakuwa or Jaymati Dol, are not merely Assam’s pride, but symbols of the civilisation the valley once attained.

Apparently, not even the dead have been spared by these rapacious elements, with 80 bighas of the historic Cheraideo Maidam having been officially sanctioned to a tea estate. Encroachers and State Revenue Department also appear to be doing their utmost to delete the heart-stirring episode of Jaymati’s martyrdom from the pages of our history. The report indicates that Jerenga Pathar, where she was tortured, is being doled out to private patta holders and public institutions, and that the Revenue Department is blocking the State Archaeological Department from building a path to her maidam. These are acts of sacrilege!...

The Assam Tribune