Complaint filed against The Hindu editor, two others for ‘controversial articles’ on Assamese community

A police complaint was lodged today against editor of the Hindu, Suresh Nambath, and two writers at the Latasil police station in Guwahati. The complaint was filed by a group called the Pravajan Virodhi Manch, an anti-infiltrator body in Assam, over “controversial articles” published in connection with the violence surrounding a recent eviction drive in Assam, according to local media reports.

The two writers are Surag Gogoi, a research scholar at the National University of Singapore, and Angshuman Choudhury, senior researcher at Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies.

Gogoi had written a piece in the Hindu on September 30 on how the violence was “not a lone wolf act but leads back to robust and embedded anti-Muslim sentiments”. Choudhury was cited in the complaint for his blogpost dated September 25 on Bijoy Bania, a photographer hired by the administration during the eviction drive who was captured on video allegedly assaulting a man lying on the ground.

The PVM alleged that Nambath, Gogoi and Choudhury intended to “promote enmity” and “disturb public tranquility” through their writing. The group on Wednesday requested that the police file an FIR against the three.

In its complaint, the PVM said that there were “many instances of offensive speech being made against Assam and the larger Assamese community” in Gogoi’s piece.

“Gogoi says that the unfortunate killing of the protesters at Gorukhuti is an example of political sadism,” the complaint said. “Most importantly, due to the Gorukhuti incident, Gogoi calls for the annihilation of the Assamese language and culture. These are serious insults to the entire Assamese community. In this article, the accused has deliberately promoted disharmony, feelings of enmity, hatred and ill-will towards the Assamese community amongst the other groups and communities of the country.”

Choudhury, meanwhile, had compared Bijoy Bania to Lachit Borphukan, a 17th century Ahom general. Later, he removed the line and added a note at the end of his blogpost which clarified that the sentence was a metaphorical analogy. In its complaint, the PVM accused Choudhury’s piece of containing “criminally motivated statements against the Assamese Hero Lachit Borphukan”.

Scroll noted that in the past, the PVM has urged the government to remove "illegal encroachers" from Assam's Sipajhar area, which they claimed was occupied by "illegal Bangladeshis. An anti-infiltrator forum, the group aims to drive out undocumented migrants from Assam.

This report was updated on October 8 with more information on the PVM.