Interview | NRC Is My Own Baby, BJP Has Made It Weak and Sick: Tarun Gogoi

New Delhi: While the Bharatiya Janata Party pats itself on the back for giving the National Register of Citizens a final shape, the Congress, after some dilly-dallying, is finally owning up to the NRC by pointing out that it was the Congress which had started the process of identifying ‘illegal citizens’ in Assam.

Even as the saffron party campaigned to aggressively drive home the point that the Congress did not have the “courage” to finalise the draft despite being in power for 15 years in the state, the grand old party initially appeared unclear about its response. It raised questions about the exclusion of over 40 lakh people in the NRC, agreed in principle with the reasons for the NRC, but did not have a clear retort to BJP’s attack on the party.

However, soon after the second Congress Working Committee meeting under Rahul Gandhi’s stewardship on August 5 in the national capital, the party changed its stance and claimed the NRC as its own ‘baby‘ and attacked the BJP for appropriating it.

Much of the credit for this, it is said, goes to three-time Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi. The Wire met the octogenarian Congress leader last week for an interview in which he discussed the NRC, the BJP state government and how the Congress plans to take on the saffron party in the 2019 general elections.

The Congress seems to now be clear on the NRC issue. Before the CWC meeting, the Assam unit of the Congress and the central leadership appeared to be speaking in different voices.

No, we’re all committed, Congress is committed. It [NRC] is our baby, our initiative. Besides, the NRC process is part of the Assam Accord signed in 1985. There is a clear definition of who is a foreigner and who is not as per the accord. Only those who came to India after March 24, 1971, are foreigners. That was the settlement between the government of India, government of Assam and All Assam Students Union (AASU). All of them were stakeholders in the accord and decided to update the NRC.

But today, the BJP is making all sorts of allegations against us. That we did not have the courage or our policy is only to appease the minorities. This is absolutely wrong.

The BJP is doing this to divert people’s attention from its failures on the governance front.

As far as the NRC is concerned, I want to ask the the BJP, what was it doing when it came to power twice at the Centre? It did not do anything at all. It is us who took it forward. In fact, we were determined to identify the foreigners. Identification was the main issue. I decided to bring on board all stakeholders. I diligently discussed the issue with AASU without whom the accord could not have been finalised. Then I took up the matter with the then prime minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, as the NRC was the job of the registrar general of India, which is under the Centre. It was not very difficult to convince Dr. Singh to go ahead with the NRC. Once he agreed, we had a meeting in 2005 to initiate the NRC proceedings.

Identification of foreigners itself was a long-drawn process preceded by many movements since 1955. There was already a citizenship act. So how can one party take the credit for the NRC?

So you are saying that the Assam Accord was the culmination of different movements?

The Assam Accord came in 1985, and on that basis, NRC has now been updated. But the process has been there for identifying foreigners in a register. We already had a register in 1951. There was already a NRC for Assam in 1951. But the Assam Accord called for an updated one with a new cut-off date – March 24, 1971, because of many reasons – the most prominent one being the independence of Bangladesh.

So this is not the first NRC.

That’s why we are calling the process as updating the NRC of 1951. A lot of people don’t have a background of this whole NRC. The 1951 NRC was for the whole of India. Assam was demanding that it should be updated as it faced the challenge of large-scale migration into the state even before India’s independence. Then after independence, it faced the problem of illegal migration. Many people from within India too migrated to Assam. Thus, there was a real problem in identifying the foreigners.

The AASU made this a political issue. Demands of closing down the borders also came up. There were all sorts of agitations from 1979 to 1985. A large number of people were also killed. You remember the Nellie massacre? AASU, which was leading the movement, boycotted the elections. So, Rajiv Gandhi government decided to go for the 1985 Assam Accord to resolve this burning issue that was peculiar to Assam.

But the BJP, in trying to take credit for NRC, has asked ‘what was Congress doing from 1985 to 2005’.

There was no mention of updating the NRC in this period. Several governments came in between. BJP was at the helm too. Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), which emerged from AASU, was supporting the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. AGP itself was in power for ten years in Assam (1985-90 and 1996-2001). What did it do?

It is we who initiated the process in 2005. The matter went to the court. That delayed the process. Such a large exercise takes time. It is after all this that the final draft has not come. The pilot project on NRC was started by us in 2010. The full process started in 2013. The BJP came to power only in 2014. But now it misleading people by hijacking the NRC.

And even for once if I agree that we did not have the courage, what was it doing in the opposition? It did not raise the issue even once. Why didn’t it put pressure on the government on the issue? Now the BJP wants to hijack it but let me say NRC is our baby, not the BJP’s. The idea was not conceived by them. The BJP lacks the sensitivity to understand the issue properly. Only because of that, a large number of people – 40 lakh – have been left out.

It is my own baby. The BJP didn’t take much care of my baby. As a result, it has become defective. The baby is defective because you did not provide sufficient food or sufficient nourishment. Instead of growing as a healthy baby, it has become a weak and sick baby.

What is the status of those 40 lakh people as of now?

See, Union home minister Rajnath Singh did not use the word but it was Amit Shah who said that the 40 lakh are ‘illegal immigrants’.

He used the word ‘guspaithiya’.

He used the word for all those who are excluded in the list for various bureaucratic reasons. Amit Shah says NRC is the ‘soul of the Assam Accord’. So, if it is the soul of Assam Accord, the NRC has to be on the basis of the definition of the Assam Accord. Then why do you support the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2016, in which you want to grant citizenship to Hindus and all communities barring Muslims from other countries The Bill, which will allow people who have come after 2014 to settle in Assam, violates the principle of the Assam Accord, which sets the date as March 24, 1971.

BJP is a party full of contradictions. It merely wants to divert people’s attention from their failures in governance. They want to make a distinction on religion also. This is against the principle of secularism, given in the preamble of our constitution. It is against the Assam Accord also. What is the purpose of finalising and preparing the NRC if you want to bring in the Citizenship Amendment Bill?

BJP wants to divide the people. That’s why they are bringing this 2014 Amendment Bill. NRC and Citizenship Bill contradict each other. Their actual intention is to implement the latter. That is why they don’t want to implement the NRC sincerely.

They would ideally like to keep NRC hanging.

They would have wanted to keep NRC hanging. But they couldn’t do it with the Supreme Court intervening.

So, you’re saying the first preference of BJP will always be the Citizenship Bill?

That is a fact. Various prominent personalities of Assam, including relatives of former president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed and former Assam chief minister Anwara Taimur, have been left out in the NRC. Not only Muslims, but people from all communities have been left out. In the same family, you’ll find some are there and some are not. Husband is there, the wife is not. Of four brothers, two are there and two are not.

You had created six or seven detention centres to house foreigners. Is that true? Your critics say that they are ‘doubtful voters’ whom the Congress wanted to use in its favour during elections.

No, that is not the case. It so happens when people are identified as foreigners or are suspected to be foreigners, you cannot immediately deport them. Where will you send them? The detention centres are for those people. When someone is identified as a foreigner by the government, they deny being one. Even if you want to deport them, Bangladesh wouldn’t accept them. It is a genuine problem.

I had taken multiple measures to stop illegal immigration at the border. Even when L.K Advani was the Union home minister, I discussed these issues with him. I started border fencing, riverine police, increased the number of border outposts. Advani didn’t do anything in this regard. When the Manmohan Singh government came, I expedited all these processes. We did a lot of things.

[Narendra] Modi took it up as a main issue in the 2014 parliamentary elections. He said that Congress has laid a red carpet for Bangladeshis and that they are taking ‘your jobs, your land, your everything’, yet it is welcoming them. He also said the moment he comes to power, he will deport them. Now let me ask him – how many has he deported? The number stands at only 1,822 people in the last four years while the Congress, over ten years, had deported more than 82,000 people. They talk too much in rhetoric, implementation is absolutely negligible.

But BJP has made the issue of foreigners an issue of national security. It is saying that the Congress deliberately does not want people to go because they are your voters.

So why don’t you send them? Now you are there. You were there for four years. Now we are not there, alright, why did you not do it? This is the job of the government of India. Who is stopping you? You said yourself you would deport them. For detection and deportation, NRC is not necessary. If there are foreigners, you can deport them. And to stop further immigration, there is border security force. Take all the major steps so that they can’t cross the border. These are ways to cover up their own failures.

Will the NRC issue be a way for the Congress in Assam to regain lost ground?

‘Way’, I don’t say. Definitely people will see which is the genuine party. I was the chief minister for 15 years, I know the ground realities.

But will the Congress be able to consolidate now? After the 2014 and the 2016 assembly elections in which you lost?

Definitely. See, NRC is only one of the issues, it is not the only issue. Other issues are there: development, whatever the BJP promised and did not fulfil, price rise, jobs, agriculture, small industries.

A question that arises often is that a significant section of Bengali Muslims supported the Congress but the party has lost that constituency to the Badruddin Ajmal-led All India United Democratic Front.

You see, this wrong impression has always been going on. In districts where AIUDF wins traditionally, the Congress never got more than 15 seats, except in 1991 and 2016. Our supporters and AIUDF’s are different.

But isn’t there a resentment within Bengali Muslims against the Congress?

See these are wrong impressions that all Muslims support the Congress. They can go anywhere. Just because you’re a Hindu doesn’t mean you will always support the BJP. Just because they’re all Muslim doesn’t mean they can’t have their own commitments to a certain ideology. For instance, we got our first MP from Dhubri, which has the highest number of Muslims, only in 1971. Whereas in my constituency, Jorhat, a Hindu Assamese constituency, we win every time. Now, of course, I have shifted to another seat. But Jorhat was my original seat. I am from Congress and was the chief minister for 15 years. How would I have done this without Assamese Hindu support?

What about Mamata Banerjee’s statement that Assam is on the verge of ‘civil war’ because of NRC?

That was unnecessary. This is not a Bengali issue. People from all communities have been left out in the NRC. It is an overall problem. But this attempt to excite Bengali sentiments is wrong. But she has not seen the Assamese community and she gives the impression as if she knows. Yes, if in the final list, such a large number of people are left out, then definitely there will be a problem. Definitely, there will be resentment, agitations if lakhs and lakhs of genuine citizens are left out.

Civil war, I don’t think so.

Overall, there is talk of opposition unity against the BJP.

That is a different thing. Even in opposition unity, there will be differences of opinion.

The AIUDF, it is said, has long wanted to ally with the Congress but you have always said no. But now in the national context, all opposition parties are coming together despite differences. Since BJP won Assam in 2016, and in 2014, half of the seats went to them, do you think there is a possibility of such an alliance?

According to me, I am quite confident, and the AICC also, that we cannot ally with the AIUDF. It is a communal party: there is no difference between the BJP and AIUDF. Both have communal agendas. So how can you oppose Hindu communalism but support Muslim communalism? I oppose the alliance based on our basic ideological differences.

Without the AIUDF, we were in power for three terms. Without it supporting us, we have gotten a large number of MPs. Last time was different. Last time, they helped the BJP by taking away our votes. There is, in fact, a secret understanding between the BJP and other parties to put candidates against the Congress to divide votes which could have gone in favour of us. Financially also, the BJP funded these parties.

Do you think Himanta Biswa Sarma’s exit was a major loss to the Congress?

Again, wrong impression. When he was there, in the Lok Sabha election in 2014, we did not win. Even in his own MLA constituency, our candidate got fewer votes than the BJP candidate. In fact, I had told him that this time the situation is going from bad to worse, most areas we are going to lose, and I doubt even your constituency. He had disagreed with me.

Subsequently we found that the BJP candidate got more than our candidate in his own constituency. When he was with us, he was a man who moved a litigation against Amit Shah. He had said “Shah carries Muslim blood”. That was his statement, he had gone to that extent. That is his double-speak.

Our main loss in 2016 was because of AIUDF. It put up so many candidates for the first time, earlier they never did. Also, AGP also supported the BJP. Other parties also went to the BJP-led alliance.

But the Congress will also have to stitch up some kind of alliance in Assam.

We are working towards it. It is possible. But there are differences of opinion within the party.

But which are the political groups Congress could ally with?

You see, there are different small groups. Our stance is very clear. We are opposed to any divisive force and any communal force. That ideology is contradictory to the Congress’s ideology of secularism. Besides that, the election campaign will be fought based on developmental issues. What the BJP promised, what it failed to do.

Will you contest the elections in 2022?

Yes, most in the party want me to contest. That is why I am keeping my options open.