In what has further exposed the Islamist link behind anti-CAA violence across the country, it has been reported that Sharjeel Imam, the organiser of the Shaheen Bagh protests who recently came into limelight for making seditious remarks to cut off Assam from the rest of India was in touch with All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) chief, Badruddin Ajmal.
He is alleged to have met Ajmal at the latter’s Delhi residence to take part in a secret meeting to discuss the anti-CAA agitation. Assam Finance Minister and NEDA Chairman, Himanta Biswa Sarma has said, “Not only with Ajmal, but Sharjeel Imam had also been in touch with many people of Assam and the police are investigating the matter.”
In a speech at the Aligarh Muslim University, Sharjeel Imam had said, “Cutting off Assam is our responsibility. Let Assam and India be separated, only then they will listen to us. You know what the condition of Muslims is in Assam, CAA, NRC has been done over there, people have been thrown in detention camps and well, the massacre is taking place over there but in the next 6-8 months, we will find that all Bengalis have been killed, be it Hindu or Muslim. So, if we want to help Assam, we ill have to close the gateway to the Northeast.”
Threatening to block Chicken’s Neck- a 22 kilometre narrow stretch of land which connects the Northeast with the rest of India and is crucial for the country’s security, Imam had said, “The Chicken’s neck belongs to the Muslims, that area is dominated by Muslims.”
Sharjeel Imam’s incendiary remarks exhorting Muslims in the region to cut off Assam by blocking access to the Northeast bordered on a terror blueprint.
And now one can easily connect the dots with the reports of Imam having been in touch with Lok Sabha MP and AIUDF chief, Badruddin Ajmal.
It is not a matter or surprise that Ajmal and Imam should come together, given that they have similar aspirations and goals when it comes to Assam.
While Sharjeel Imam has publicly proclaimed his separatist plans, Ajmal is clearly the face of Bangladeshi illegal Muslim immigrants in the state. While Badruddin Ajmal has maintained that the Bengali-speaking Muslims are not Bangladeshis, the party continues to draw fire for appeasing the Bangladeshi Muslim vote bank, which is, of course, a major political asset that the AIUDF does not want to lose.
Throughout the anti-CAA violence that had taken grip of Assam in the month of December last year, it was the AIUDF which had taken the lead in keeping Assam on the boil. Himanta Biswa Sarma had even alleged that the vehicles used in the anti-CAA violence were financed by Ajmal.
From Sharjeel Imam’s seditious remarks to cut off Assam from the rest of the country, Badruddin Ajmal’s support for the Bangladeshi illegal Muslim immigrants and the anti-CAA violence in Assam in December last year, it can be concluded that secessionism is on their mind and they are trying to exploit a certain demographic advantage in order to give effect to their ulterior motives.
The dominant majority in the Chicken Corridor that Sharjeel Imam wanted to capitalise upon is the reason why Badruddin Ajmal enjoys significant political capital in Assam today. Both of them seem to strongly believe that this significant demographic advantage will help them in achieving their political ends.
Such has been the political presence of Badruddin Ajmal that it was being said that he would become the Assam Chief Minister by 2021. Even recently, BJP’s key man in the Northeast, Himanta Biswa Sarma expressed concern over rising Muslim population in the state and said, “Ajmal Badruddin (AIDUF chief) or his son or his grandson will be the state chief minister after 30 years. No one can stop it”.
While AIUDF has supported the formation of a new political alternative in Assam led by Assamese chauvinists compromising of AASU leadership, artistes’ fraternity and other opponents of the CAA, it must be kept in mind that the goals of chauvinists are different, dichotomous.
want all ‘outsiders’ including illegal Bangladeshi immigrants and Bengali Hindus to be excluded from Assam, the political capital of Ajmal or for that matter even the plans of Sharjeel Imam are based on the inflating Bangladeshi illegal immigrants population, which also explains their opposition to the NRC, while the Assamese chauvinists were the ones who had pushed an NRC in Assam in the first place.
Reports of Sharjeel Imam having met Ajmal lead to multiple inferences. The most obvious ones being how the two have common goals and how secessionist tendencies are on their mind.
More importantly, it also reveals that there could have been a lot more than what meets the eye as far as anti-CAA violence in Assam in December last year is concerned. Imam’s involvement with Ajmal, the face of illegal Bangladeshi infiltrators, shows that radicalisation and separatism of a much more nefarious kind might be underway in Assam. Even the Greater Bangladesh project might be on the minds of such elements who have hatched a conspiracy against CAA-NRC in Assam.