This river crusader’s death turned tide against ULFA

Twenty years ago to this day, at the riverine island of Majuli, a 38-year-old man set out to speak to village men at a goat farm. But what happened thereafter, changed the discourse of the state’s politics forever.

Sanjay Ghose, a rural development activist, who was working in the island to help the local people deal with the onslaught of the Brahmaputra, set out to meet the villagers who stayed close to the river to discuss ways of dealing with the problem. Soon after, some men who said they were from the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) asked Ghose and his colleague Chandan Doley to cycle with them. That was the last that anyone ever heard of Ghose.

Ghose’s wife, Sumita, who was at another end of the island, remembers the endless wait. “For the longest time, we did not know what had happened. The ULFA gave out contradictory statements, and there was a lot of running around. If a violation is caused by the state, you can go to the police, the court, an MP or an MLA to complain. But, who does one protest to about an outlawed organisation, which is faceless?” Sumita says.

It was later …read more