What’s making Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra a bumpy ride in BJP-ruled Assam

It was a roller-coaster ride through potholes and puddles in most of the 480-km stretch from Thoubal in Manipur to Nagaland-Assam border point at Haluwating.

Leaving behind the bumpy road, when Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra (Unite India Justice March) reached the plains of Assam on January 18, the fifth day of the road journey that was flagged off at Thoubal on January 14, it faced a new challenge.

The hegemonic BJP and its fringe elements have pulled out all the stops to put a spanner in the yatra, indicating that the saffron brigade this time is in no mood to allow the Congress leader a seamless journey.

Hurdles for BJNY in Assam

The BJP is in power in all the northeastern states barring Mizoram, but its Hindutva ideology has firmly taken root only in Assam and Tripura. The Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra (BJNY) that seeks to battle that ideology is facing a counter-offensive in Assam, the state where the saffron party has a very strong political and ideological presence.

The first sign of reprisal came as soon as the Yatra crossed over to Assam from Nagaland. The route was flanked with hoardings seeking “Justice for Angkita.”

Angkita Dutta, daughter of former Assam Pradesh Congress president Anjan Dutta, was expelled from the Congress for “anti-party activities” after she accused Indian Youth Congress (IYC) president Srinivas BV of being “sexist and chauvinistic.”

As state president of the IYC, she claimed to have faced “harassment and gender discrimination” from Srinivas. With the hoarding campaign, the BJP tried to spin a counter justice narrative even as the Congress claimed that Angkita has been “weaponised” by Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma.

FIR against yatra for 'deviating from route'

The Assam leg of the journey so far has also encountered a series of administrative and political disruptions, including filing of an FIR against the BJNY and its principal organiser KB Byju for allegedly deviating from the assigned route in Jorhat town.

The FIR was lodged on January 18 minutes after Rahul took the battle to Sarma’s door, dubbing him the most corrupt chief minister of the country.

The Wayanad MP was again prevented from visiting Srimanta Sankardeva’s birthplace Bordowa (also spelled as Batadrava) on Monday (January 22) morning as the visit coincided with the Ram temple consecration ceremony at Ayodhya. The 15^th century social reformer and Vaishnavite saint Sankardeva was a symbol of Assam’s inclusive culture that has been allegedly under attack under the BJP regime.

The BJNY was also denied permission to pass through the main thoroughfares of Guwahati on Tuesday (January 23).

Similar administrative hurdles were also put up in BJP-ruled Manipur. The yatra flag-off ceremony had to be shifted to Thoubal as the state government refused permission in the capital city of Imphal.

Invitation to address varsity students revoked

In what came as a fresh challenge for the Yatra, on Tuesday morning, Rahul alleged that while he was supposed to interact with several hundred students of University of Science and Technology, Meghalaya, (USTM) in Meghalaya's Ri Bhoi district, bordering Assam, his invitation was revoked after the involvement of Home Minister Amit Shah.

He claimed the directive to the varsity authorities was conveyed by the Union minister through the Assam chief minister's office.

Keeping in step with the spirit of the Yatra, Rahul, however held a spontaneous interaction with students at a nearby hotel on the suppression of voices and individual freedoms by the current government. After the conversation, he addressed a huge group of students gathered on the road near the USTM university in an impromptu speech.

"I wanted to come to your university and address you, listen to you. But what happened is that the Home Minister of India called up the Chief Minister of Assam and the CMO called up the leadership of the university and said that Rahul Gandhi must not be allowed to speak to the students," he said, addressing students and others from atop his Yatra bus in the Assam-Meghalaya border.

Physical attack on yatra in Assam

The Yatra encountered ugly stretches too. It took a violent turn when BJP supporters on Sunday (January 21) even went to the extent of physically attacking participants of the rally, leaving Assam Pradesh Congress chief Bhupen Kumar Borah with a bloody nose. Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh's vehicle too came under attack.

The aggressions, many feel, are not isolated, but part of a larger political design.

“The attacks show that the BJP this time is not taking Rahul Gandhi lightly, unlike the previous edition of the yatra, which it largely chose to ignore,” said political commentator and former director general of Assam Police Harekrishna Deka.

Rahul’s gruelling five-month-long foot march from Kanyakumari in the southern tip of India to Kashmir in the north that ended in January last year significantly burnished his image, catapulting him as a principal challenger to BJP’s Narendra Modi.

The 53-year-old leader’s approval rating increased by 15 per cent after the Bharat Jodo Yatra, according to a survey conducted immediately after his unity march by the NDTV in association with Lokniti-Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS).

Another polling agency C-Voter too had found three to nine per cent increase in Rahul’s popularity ratings across all the states he had walked through.

Is the BJP insecure?

“The way the people are spontaneously coming out to support the BJNY, the BJP apprehends that it could this time snowball into a mass movement. Their insecurity has become obvious from the attacks,” Deka told The Federal.

He said it's out of that fear that the BJP and the elements patronised by it are trying to derail the yatra. The offensive would end up giving more mileage and publicity to the yatra, Deka added.

Leading social scientist and litterateur Hiren Gohain too claimed that the BJP has been rattled by the yatra’s growing popularity.

“It’s apparent from the chief minister’s (Sarma) body language. Nervousness has been writ large on his face,” Gohain said.

Taking serious exceptions to the attacks, both Deka and Gohain said what unfolded in the last few days in Assam was against the political culture of the state. This kind of culture was never seen before in Assam, they said in unison, adding that it was the current ruling party BJP’s contribution to the state.