Guwahati, January 7 (PTI): Less than a year after Miyah literature associated with Bengal-origin Muslims stoked controversy, the birth of an Islamic literary organisation in Assam has triggered a storm with several organisations, including one representing Assamese Muslims, questioning the new body’s motives.
The Assam Islamic Sahitya Sabha had on January 5 issued a statement announcing its upcoming conference at Adabari in western Assam’s Nalbari district, from March 13-15. A meeting of the Sabha’s delegates headed by its president Iftikar Hussain, a retired government officer, is scheduled for January 12 in Guwahati.
The Sabha had named Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Narayan Deka, who represents the Barkhetri constituency, as the chief patron of its Nalbari conference. Adabari is in Mr. Deka’s constituency.
The right-wing Hindu Kranti Dol criticised the BJP MLA for “sacrificing your religion and culture for vote-bank politics”.
Deka, however, asserted that the Sabha had named him as its chief patron without his consent. The disclaimer notwithstanding, the MLA’s name has generated suspicion about the BJP having promoted the organisation to undermine the protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA).
“It is anybody’s guess why a religion-based literary body has sprung up when the people of Assam are agitating for the repeal of CAA,” All Assam Students’ Union president Dipanka Kumar Nath said on Tuesday.
The Assam Sahitya Sabha, the State’s highest literary body, also sniffed a political design behind the creation of the Sabha.
The All Assam Goria-Moria Yuva Chhatra Parishad, an Assamese Muslim students’ forum, also slammed the Sabha’s formation. “This is a conspiracy and we will not allow them to succeed,” the Parishad said in a statement.
