DIBRUGARH, March 12 - In a scathing attack, Sunil Rajkonwar, the founder president of the newly-formed Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) Anchalik Manch today described the central AGP leaders as opportunists, who had bypassed the standing decision of the General House of the party to sign the poll alliance with a national political party in their bid to rehabilitate themselves.
Rajkonwar and his fellow party leaders were accorded rousing welcome by hundreds of supporters on their arrival at Mohanbari Airport from Guwahati today. The leaders were then escorted to the district AGP office at Chowkidinghee where they addressed the gathering.
While justifying the formation of the AGP Anchalik Mancha in front of the huge gathering, Rajkonwar said that the AGP was all about regionalism. Its core agenda is to protect the interest of the region democratically. The party was born out of the Assam Accord. The Assam Accord meant that all illegal foreigners must be identified and deported. But the AGP leaders dumped this burning issue by signing a poll alliance with the BJP, which is seeking to provide refugee status and citizenship to the illegal Hindu Bangladeshis. For BJP only Muslims Bangladeshis are foreigners, he said.
Rajkonwar, also the president of the Asom Yuva Parishad, the youth wing of the AGP said that the new party had to be created to safeguard the ideals of regionalism.
�We are driven by ideology and not by party tickets. We are neither starting a new political party nor reacting for being denied party tickets. We have not separated from the AGP. We have only come forward to carry forward the ideals and principles of the regional party that stood tall for more than 30 years. We are compelled to field candidates who can strengthen regionalism and prevent it from getting saturated with the national political parties,� he said.
Rajkonwar said the AGP leaders betrayed the party workers by going for the poll pact with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
�They had said that they were going to Delhi for personal works. But they signed an alliance by misleading us. The leaders of the Asom Yuva Parishad were also kept in the dark. Our leaders have often attracted distrust for their works. Sometimes they meet the Congress MLAs, sometimes the Chief Minister, sometimes Anjan Dutta, sometimes AIUDF chief Badruddin Ajmal and sometimes Himanta Biswa Sarma. What ideology are they following?� he asked.
The AGP leader told the gathering that the new party will battle against exploitation, betrayal, injustice, communalism and anti-regionalism.
