It all started a few months ago during a routine check by Assam police of vehicles coming from Shillong, the Meghalaya capital. The Chief Executive Member of the North Cachar Hills Autonomous District Council was found to be carrying one crore rupees in cash. On interrogation, he confessed that he was carrying the money for one Jewel Garlossa, leader of Dima Halam Daoga (DHD), an armed militant group operating in the N. C. Hills district. He volunteered the information that he had already paid three crore rupees to Garlossa.

(The Autonomous District Councils, enjoying a large measure of autonomy, were created for the tribals of the hill districts of north-eastern States, under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. The Chief Executive Member's position in the district is analogous to that of the Chief Minister in the State.)

As an extremist organization was involved, New Delhi ordered the inquiry to be conducted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA). In its final chargesheet submitted in the court of the Special Judge in Guwahati on November 17, last year, the NIA said some elected members of the N. C. Hills Autonomous Council had helped the outlawed Garlossa faction of the DHD by siphoning off Council funds. However, the full report of the NIA was not made public. Until, that is, a section of the Press got hold of it and published it. This was in March.

It was reported the NIA had found that a total of Rs. 1000 crore rupees was involved and that seven ministers of the Gogoi Cabinet, a Congress MP, several officials and private contractors were involved in it. The NIA named them in its report. The scam was found to have continued for full ten years, from 2001 2010 till its detection. NIA reportedly recommended that the Government hand over the inquiry to a Central agency like the CBI.

This caused a furore in the State. The Opposition and the Press were up in arms demanding a CBI inquiry. For reasons not clear, Chief Minister Gogoi was against it. It was said that the Congress MP involved in the scam was a close relation of the Chief Minister. And one of the ministers was a very powerful one and close to Mr Gogoi. Eventually, however, under Centre's pressure, Mr Gogoi yielded and the inquiry was handed over to the CBI. This was in February this year.

A few days ago, the CBI arrested a junior engineer of the Social Welfare Department along with several officials and contractors. The house of a relation of the engineer was raided and Rs. 13.45 crore was recovered. The alleged involvement of several ministers and others of the Congress has come as a big shot in the arms for the Opposition parties which are divided and still unsure of possible electoral allies.

Another sore point with the Opposition is that while the NIA report had said 33 departments of the Autonomous Council were involved, Mr Gogoi has restricted the CBI inquiry to only five departments in which, it is said, the scam does not involve any of his Cabinet colleagues. The five departments are: Rural Development, Soil Conservation, PWD, Public Health Engineering and Agriculture. Crores of rupees were taken out of the treasury by contractors, in collusion with politicians, bureaucrats and extremists, by submitting false or inflated bills for work not done.

The Opposition's ballyhoo against the ruling party, however, seems to have left the common man cold. Going by newspaper reports and discussions in the electronic media, the general reaction seems to be that no party is sincere about weeding out corruption and looting of public funds. All they are interested in is to take electoral mileage out of the scams.

Judging by the prevalent mood it is a moot question how far the Opposition will be able to exploit the North Cachar Hills scam to its advantage. Mr Gogoi's real problem will be to keep the minority community, the traditional vote bank of the Congress, in the party's fold. Large sections of religious and linguistic minorities have shifted their allegiance to the All India United Democratic Front (AIDUF), led by the respected Mr Badruddin Ajmal. The AIDUF has nine MLAs. Mr Gogoi's recent attempts to persuade it to merge with the Congress have failed. Efforts at splitting it and weaning away a section of it have not also met with much success. Mr Ahmed, on his part, has given indications that he may join the Trinamool Congress. The coming months are likely to see interesting developments in the State's politics. (IPA)