Assam's Fate and a Bloody Line

This day marks the birth of Bhimbor Deori, the Assamese Nationalist who made sure that Assam remained very much a part of India.
The Bust of Bhimbor Deori; Source: Wikimedia Commons

The Bust of Bhimbor Deori; Source: Wikimedia Commons

In Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot is fear and a warning. The earth is but a speck of dust in a vast nothingness. This speck over the centuries has been broken into several parts, so rigidly that going from one such part to another requires so many permissions that most people spend their lives in just one corner of it!

One such line was drawn between India and Pakistan in 1947. A barbed wire was coloured by the blood of people. The fate of millions was changed and even destroyed by a line on a sheet of paper. In this situation, hung the neck of Assam as well as its future.

The plans were made. The Cabinet Mission sent from an island on the other corner of the world to preserve India's unity had ended up failing in half of its mission.

The division was apparent and with this Assam was supposed to go into East Pakistan.

Can one man change the shape of a country? Can one man decide what will happen to 202,270 km² on the face of the earth? While this looks like an impossible and gigantic task, the lines were moved by one man's attempts.

In the hills of Assam lived a visionary, Bhimbor Deori. He could smell the conspiracy in the air as the plans hatched.

Playing his political acumen, Deori challenged the British authority and through diplomatic strategies made sure that Assam stayed very much a part of India.

Deori is considered today as a true nationalist. Born on 16 May 1903, in an indigenous Assamese community, he fought for India's freedom and changed the fate of his land on the eve of the change in colonial power. But this was not his only contribution.

Two years before Indian independence he had other plans in his bag. He set up a “Khasi Darbar Hall Resolutions” with the intention for freedom and separate homelands in opposition to Indian occupation. Freedom was in his blood, his heart and mind and his farsightedness always helped him see much beyond in the future than his fellow men. Self-independence was his idea!

Deori was a trained lawyer and could have chosen a posh city life for himself but he chose to work for tribal communities' independence. He set up an Assam Plain Tribal League to fight for land for his people and ensure their land revenues were remitted.

He made sure that when the list of Scheduled Tribes in India was prepared, Deori community finds its name there!

He didn't live long enough to enjoy the fruits of freedom and passed only three months after the country became independent, but on terms with the vision he had for Assam and his people. Today, while Assamese struggle with finding documents to prove whether they are Indian citizens or not, Deori's prescience stands to a test!

16 likes

 
Share your Thoughts
Let us know what you think of the story - we appreciate your feedback. 😊
16 Share