ULFA has links with rival AGP: Assam CM

Even as the anti-talks faction of the banned United Liberation Front of India is on the prowl against the ruling Congress in the run up to election, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on Friday alleged that the faction had links with the rival regional political party, Asom Gana Parishad.

Addressing media persons, Gogoi said: "I believe that the ULFA anti-talks faction would like AGP and Bharatiya Janata Party to come to power in Assam after the polls."

Both the AGP and the BJP, however, vehemently refuted the allegation and termed it baseless. The AGP, in fact, countered it by saying that it was the Congress that took help of the ULFA in the 2001 polls.

The ULFA anti-talks faction triggered a blast at Assam Pradesh Congres Committee headquarter on March 14 in which three Congress leaders were injured. But Gogoi on Friday tried to make light of the ULFA threat saying that the threat had been there since a long time.

He said it (threat) would not disrupt Congress' electioneering because of the level of enthusiasm within the party.

"You see, there is infighting in the Congress because of the dispute over party nominations. It is natural because there are only 126 seats. Had the partymen been scared of the ULFA threat would they have hit the streets demanding party tickets

to contest polls," Gogoi asked.

He asserted that the threat from the ULFA faction and infighting within the party in some constituencies over allotment of party tickets were not going to affect Congress prospects in the election.

"I know some party leaders have even left to join other parties after failing to get party nomination. It had happened earlier too. All of them will come back home (Congress) later because once a Congressman is always a Congressman," Gogoi said, adding that the Congress will win more seats than the previous assembly election.

Gogoi said the people of Assam had no alternative but the Congress. He alleged that the AGP miserably failed to put the state on the path of peace and development while it was in power in two terms. "The people of Assam still remembered the days of under development and terror during the AGP rule."

"The BJP leaders remember Assam and its people only when the election is around the corner. The BJP did not do anything for Assam when the party was in power in the Centre. Their then Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had stirred the hornet's nest in Assam by proposing to provide work permits to illegal migrants from Bangladesh in Assam while his government did not do anything concrete to address to the problem of illegal migration," Gogoi said.