The people of Nagaland, Meghalaya and Manipur have sent a message by voting against the candidates of the ruling alliance in the Lok Sabha polls — minorities are “insecure” under the ruling BJP.
Assam PCC president Bhupen Kumar Borah asserted this at an event held at the Rajiv Bhawan in Guwahati on Friday to felicitate the party’s three newly-elected MPs — Pradyut Bordoloi (Nagaon), Rakibul Hussain (Dhubri) and Gaurav Gogoi (Jorhat).
Borah’s assertion comes after Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma attributed the defeat of the NDA candidates to a “particular religious community” in these states. The BJP’s allies — NDDP, NPF and NPP — lost their respective Lok Sabha seats in Nagaland, Manipur (outer Manipur) and Meghalaya (Tura) to the Congress.
Thanking the people of Assam for supporting the Congress, Borah said: “Somebody is saying that Rakibul Hussain getting so many votes is not good. We want to know why the minority section of Nagaon voted for the Congress. Why did the Congress win the two seats in Manipur? Why did the Congress win in Meghalaya? Why did Modi’s winning margin fall in Varanasi? Why did the BJP lose in Ayodhya even after building the Ram temple?”
Borah added: “We have got the results of our fight against communal forces. The message the people of Nagaland, Manipur, Meghalaya and Assam (Dhubri and Nagaon) have sent is that minorities are feeling insecure under the BJP. We have also sent a message from Rajiv Bhawan that we will continue to fight against communal forces.”
Later talking to The Telegraph, the Assam PCC president said that people want development. “We were thinking that after the results our chief minister would talk about development, industry, price rise, employment... but he has gone overboard by giving religious colour to the defeat of the BJP allies in the northeast,” Borah said.
Borah pointed out how the BJP tried to “woo” the Muslim voters during the elections but started targetting them after the results were out. He said he did not mean only the Muslims by “minorities”. Assam has a Muslim population of over 34 per cent and a Christian population of over three per cent. In the Northeast, the Christian population is about 20 per cent.
Gaurav Gogoi had gone after Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma for his “irresponsible and reckless statement” over the losses suffered by the BJP allies in three northeastern states.
In a post on X, Gogoi said, “... He (Sarma) does not have the maturity to accept the responsibility for the losses of the NDA in Nagaland, Meghalaya and Manipur. I appeal to the Chief Ministers of the respective states to publicly condemn the statement. Together we must preserve the unique identity of the Northeast.”
Gaurav, on Friday, praised Borah’s “strong leadership” during the elections. “Because of his leadership, we have won three seats and also put up a good fight in Guwahati, Karimganj, Silchar and Kaziranga. Our PCC president is responsible for getting the Opposition united... His stand on Dhubri helped us win the Dhubri seat by a massive margin...”
The Voice of the People Party (VPP) of Meghalaya and the Rising People’s Party (RPP) of Nagaland also tore into Sarma.
VPP chief Ardent Miller Basaiawmoit in a video message on Friday said: “This is a message I would like to send to Himanta Biswa Sarma, chief minister of Assam, who seems to be a habitual loose talker, that he should mind his own business and should rather look at his own backyard... I strongly condemn the statement made by Himanta Biswa Sarma that a particular religion in Meghalaya was the cause for the defeat of the NDA candidate in this parliamentary election. I would also like to tell him that the church in Meghalaya has never been involved in any electoral politics. However, as a community, we will choose to elect a party or a candidate who believes in the Constitution of India and secularism...”
The VPP won the Shillong seat by defeating sitting Congress MP Vincent Pala while the Congress defeated the ruling NPP candidate Agatha Sangma.