GUWAHATI, Feb 8 � The Octogenarians� Club of Guwahati has condemned the faux pas made by the BJP in terming the citizens of the North-east immigrants, thereby insulting the prestige and image of the 48 million people of the North-east.
The club, at its meeting held on February 7 under the presidentship of Mahesh Bhuyan, however, observed that raising of slogans, wailing, howling, and burning of BJP flags would scarcely help in raising the status of the Assamese and the north-eastern people in the estimation of the rest of the country.
The octogenarians held that Assam and the North-east could give a befitting reply to the people of the rest of the country in general and those responsible for this unfortunate happening in particular by making resolutions in order to create an intellectual climate in this part of the country so that dozens of intellectuals like Anundoram Borooah, Hem Baruah and Bhupen Hazarika and scores of talented personalities like Mary Kom, Bhogeswar Baruah and Adil Hussain are produced.
General secretary of the club DN Chakravartty, while initiating the discussion, said that instead of shouting from Dighalipukhuripar, talented Assamese should proceed to Delhi and other metropolitan cities to take the leadership in different spheres in the way Arnab Goswami has been doing for the past few years.
The meeting also discussed the problem arising out of the engineering manipulation by China in drying up the Brahmaputra in the plains of India, thereby exposing vast areas of the subcontinent to the gravest natural disaster.
The meting called upon the Government of India to build up international opinion in the United Nations in order to prevent China from committing such grave crimes against humanity in this part of the country. The meeting also felicitated Dhiren Baruah on his being appointed as Chairman of the GMDA.
Acknowledging the felicitation, Baruah said that while the first phase of the greater water supply scheme for Guwahati was expected to be commissioned during the forthcoming Rongali Bihu, when one-third of the city with 98 per cent population would be assured of 24-hour water supply, the rest of the city would be given water supply from 2017.
Baruah said it would have been proper to shift the Gauhati High Court from the present site to North Guwahati, while the DC Court should be shifted to Chandrapur instead of to Chenikuthi as has been proposed now.
Baruah further said it was unfortunate that the Sarusola waterbody area was flung open to human occupation disregarding the urgency of maintaining it as a water reservoir. He condemned the indiscriminate encroachment by the land mafia in different areas of the city.
