The biggest casualty of Assam BJP's rise has been Assamese nationalism (what Delhi think-tanks refer to as Assamese subnationalism) in its electoral form. This election will decide whether Assamese nationalism and the particular type of identity based pro-federalism politics in the non-tribal areas of Assam will give away to a more general Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan-type Hindu-Muslim politics in Assam.

Defying the decision of its general council, top leaders of the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), the principal electoral voice of Assamese nationalism (with “regionalism” and federalism being their signature planks), have allied with the BJP. AGP has been given a measly 24 seats out of 126 – thus underscoring its stock value after years of hemorrhage in their political base. There is a distinct possibility that the BJP-led alliance might win.

However, it seems that to a significant section of the AGP cadre and its more ideologically less-slippery leaders, winning is not everything. The AGP has split on this issue, with the former AGP youth wing president Sunil Rajkonwar leading the new formation AGP (Ancholikotabadi Moncho/Regionalist platform). He points out the incompatibility of AGP ideology with a Hindu-nationalist Delhi-headquartered formation like the BJP - “People supported the AGP because it is a secular regional force and fought for regional interests. But people will not tolerate them joining hands with the communal BJP .”

AGP's veteran ideological stalwarts like Thaneswar Boro have joined the new formation. AGP has split several times before, but this split has been the most ideologically driven among them. While it's improbable that AGP(AM) will immediately emerge as a principal pivot in Assam politics, the orphaned ideological stances that it wants to defend go to the soul of post-Partition Assamese politics and the principles enshrined in the 1985 Assam accord. The accord ended the All Assam Students Union (AASU)-led Assam movement which stood for protecting the rights of the sons of the soil of Assam (this movement has served as the template of the Bodoland agitation and various other such homeland identity and rights movements in the region).

One the one hand, this meant demands for the identification and banishment of illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh, irrespective of religion. On the other hand, it sought to develop an Assam-centric politics, including protection of Assamese culture and language, protection of economic and homeland rights. These issues are tied to the devolution of power from the Union centre to the state and hence, greater political democratization. This democratizing and decentralizing thrust forms the core of federalist politics in the Indian Union. The AGP was born out of the churning of the Assam movements and was for many years one of the strongest votaries of decentralization and federalism.

On the communal question: AGP's ideology is diametrically opposed to that of the BJP which considers the Indian Union to the natural host to all persecuted people of Dharmic faiths (Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, etc). This is where AGP's homeland imagination becomes clear – it naturally starts and ends with Assam. The AGP stance has been that if the Government of India insists on hosting persecuted Hindus and Buddhists of Bangladesh, they have to be settled and given political rights in non-Assam India.

Thus, Muslim Bengalis of lower Assam and Hindu Bengalis of Barak valley have long been the support base for the Congress, which has ruled Assam for the longest period by forging a broad front of various ethnic minorities along-with a section of the Assamese themselves. In this election, many fear an implosion of the Congress front – with Muslim Bengalis remaining with the Congress and the Hindu Bengalis going with the BJP which has promised illegal immigrants among them a path to citizenship.

With the Muslim Bengali being constructed as the biggest threat to Assam, the shift of a significant section of Assamese Hindus to the BJP (many Assam BJP leaders are ex-AASU and AGP leaders) would make the communal polarization complete. Assam will join the “mainstream” via tried and tested Hindu-Muslim politics of South Asia. This is most damaging for the Assamese regionalists, who fear being left without a core constituency. The situation of Muslim Assamese is particularly tricky, who are faced with an unenviable choice between their faith and ethno-linguistic identity, due to BJP's aggressive Hinduization of what has long a very composite Assamese identity in the Assamese national imagination.

In November last year, BJP MP Yogi Adityanath tried to hinduize Ahom glory by hailing the legendary Ahom general Lachit Borphukan as a Hindu general who defeated Aurrangzeb's invading 'Muslim' army at the Battle of Saraighat. What is deliberately left unsaid is that the invading “Muslim” army was led by Ram Singh I, the ruler of Amber and the elder son of Raja Jai Singh I. Crucial to the Ahom victories under Lachit Borphukan was the daring bravery of the top Assamese military officer 'Bagh Hazarika' Ismail Siddique, an Assamese Muslim. In fact, in the Assamese historical imagination (including that of the United Liberation Front of Asom -ULFA), both Lachit Barphukan and Ismail Siddique were on the side of Asom and the native Assamese people while Aurangzeb and Ram Singh I represented then what Yogi Adityanath represents now - the forces of Delhi.

If people from the land of “Bharat mata ki Jai” were to visit Assam, they would see in every corner, monuments and slogans hailing another territorial mother, Mother Axom. The slogan “Joy Ai Axom” (Ai meaning mother) speaks of a different imagination of mother and motherland. Such aspirations may be deemed illegal in a super-centralized politico-judicial system that views dissenting diversity as the greatest enemy but they are neither illegitimate nor unreal.

The various ethno-linguistic homelands which constitute the Indian Union have always been in various depths of integration with the concept of India. A simple mind-game would demonstrate this. Close your eyes and try to place Madhya Pradesh, Assam and Nagaland in an increasing order of integration with the concept of India. Your particular ordering is unimportant but the fact that this mental exercise can be done at all tells us something.

However, depths of integration are not uniform within the constituent ethno-linguistic homelands either. Even there exists a broad spectrum – from total identification and association to complete alienation and separateness. In case of Assam, this spectrum is represented by the AGP and its splinters, AASU, AJYCP, pro-talk ULFA, SULFA, BJP, Congress and other organizations, including those like ULFA(I) which cannot make themselves heard in the official 'public space'.

Though the Indian Union provides an over-arching context and has also been understood as the force whose hegemonic Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan thrust is most likely to defeat the particular culture and identity of Assam, this is essentially an internal dialogue within the Assamese people about the soul of Assam. What is the destiny of Assam as a homeland, as a society, as a culture, as an identity?

Intricately tied to this question is the future of Assamese nationalism. This debate about the destiny of Assam as identity has various stake-holders who represent viewpoints and imaginations of Assam's future, even an Assamese future. In the political battlefield so polarized between 'Bharat mata' and 'illegal Bangladeshis', Ai Axom is lonelier than ever. (IPA Service)