No tie-up with AGP if it goes with BJP: AUDF

By our Staff Reporter GUWAHATI, Oct 19: The AUDF today said it will not go with the AGP in the forthcoming Lok Sabha election if the regional party goes for seat-sharing or alliance with the BJP. This statement of the AUDF came close on the heels of AGP president Chandra Mohan Patowary announcing yesterday that the regional party would not go for any poll alliance with the BJP in the coming Lok Sabha polls. Patowary, however, said that there might be seat-sharing between the AGP and the BJP. Talking to The Sentinel today, AUDF working president Hafij Rashid Ahmed Choudhury said: “After the AGP-AUDF meeting on electoral alliance last night, the central executive committee of the AUDP met and decided not to go for any poll understanding with the AGP if the regional party opts for understating of any sort with the BJP.” He said the AUDF’s talks with the Left parties and the NCP have been progressing. According to sources, the SP may also join the anti-Congress and anti-BJP formation that is in the making in the State. Since the SP is part of the UPA Government at the Centre, the Asom SP unit will be taken to the formation only if it agrees to take an anti-Congress stand in Asom. Meanwhile, talking to newsmen in Guwahati today, AUDF president Badruddin Ajmal condemned the recent violence in Udalguri and Darrang districts and held the Congress Government in the State responsible for that. “Had the State Government controlled the August 14 MUSA bandh, the violence could have been averted,” he said, and demanded Rs 10 lakh as compensation to the next of kin of each killed, Rs 1 lakh for each injured and Rs 5 lakh for each affected family staying in relief camps. We won’t allow division of anti-Cong votes : AGP Staff Reporter GUWAHATI, Oct 19: With the AUDF making its stand clear today that it would not go for any electoral alliance with AGP if it opted to go for alliance or understanding with the BJP, the regional party is on the back foot. Sources in the party, however, said the party is still confident of going together with all the anti-Congress parties like the BJP, Left and the AUDF. Talking to this reporter, AGP spokesman Atul Bora said: “A team of the AGP will go to New Delhi soon to hold talks with BJP leaders on poll alliance, and after its return to the State, the team will hold a formal discussion with the Left parties and the AUDF to find a formula in which the anti-Congress votes remain intact.”

Remove Shakeel Ahmed from ministry: BJP By our Staff Reporter GUWAHATI, Oct 19: Reacting sharply to the Union minister Shakeel Ahmed-led All India Congress Committee (AICC) team’s report to Sonia Gandhi that the BJP, AGP and the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) were behind the recent violence in Udalguri and Darrang districts, BJP’s central observer for Asom Harendra Pratap Singh said today that if the BJP was involved in the violence then what prevented the Congress-led Government in Asom from arresting the BJP leaders. He demanded of the government to remove Shakeel Ahmed from the ministry immediately. Talking to newsmen in Guwahati today, Singh said: “The recent violence in Darrang and Udalguri was not an ethnic clash as stated by the State Government. It was an international conspiracy hatched by Islamic outfits to make Asom free from Hindus. Union Minister of State for Home Shakeel Ahmed should be immediately removed from the post as he preferred to play communal politics on the violence in Asom.” Singh said the BJP will stage statewide dharna on October 24 in protest against the attack on the indigenous people of the State in Udalguri and Darrang districts. “One shouldn’t take the recent statement made by the AAMSU that Asomiyas will not be allowed to enter Dhubri district lightly. The threat from the AMSU came close on the heels of Madrassa students banning the entry of AASU leaders into Karimganj district in the Barak Valley. The situation aggravated when the MUSA called Asom bandh on August 14 coinciding with the Independence Day of Pakistan when one Dipak Rabha was killed at a place under Rowta police outpost,” Singh said, and added: “Mystery shrouds the Dipak Rabha killing investigation. Investigation Officer Hridayananda Das was transferred and present investigation officer NC Das could arrest only one Moijal Haque, advisor of the MUSA, that too after ten days of the killing. Why have not been the other people involved in the killing arrested yet? Only the general diary of Dipak Das killing case is available in Rowta police outpost, there is no investigation officer’s report and data. This shows that the government doesn’t want to stop such killings, and that led to the recent fierce violence in Darrang and Udalguri districts.” On October 3 three Garos were killed in front of the Darrang SP, but the government has not taken action against the SP, the BJP leader said, and added: “The State Government should make the antecedents of MUSA public, as the Islamic outfits, more often than not, change their names when they are banned by the government”. On the State Government’s claim that normalcy has returned to Ualguri and Darrang districts, the BJP leader said: “The fact remains that the violence affected people have no faith on the security that the government promised to provide them, and as such they are apprehensive to go back to their villages.”