As is the case in most situations, initial reports about the killings were sketchy and appeared to be more conjecture than facts…E.g.

…The communally tense twin districts of Assam, Udalguri and Darrang, witnessed yet another day of rioting as the death toll climbed to nine on Saturday. Over 50 people have been injured in clashes between Bodo tribals and Muslims that broke out on Friday…”

Udalguri police said reports about hoisting of a Pakistani national flag at Sonaripara caused fresh turmoil. [ link ]

A report from HT suggested another angle to the attacks:

The immediate provocation for the clashes was the attack on a group of Village Defence Party (VDP) volunteers early Friday by armed miscreants.

“The VDP members belonged to the tribal Bodo community and were attacked by members of a religious minority group and that sparked off the clashes,” the official said.

Meanwhile the death toll continued to climb…but the matter appeared to have dropped off the radar of mainstream media…Latest reports suggest that the death toll is already higher than the number of people killed in attacks in Orissa (49 according to this report)…but I have not yet seen any detailed report on the attacks and what triggered them…

Could it be because the reality appears to be slightly more complicated here?

According to this report, the clashes are not really between “tribals” and Muslims or Hindus and Muslims or even Hindus and Christians but between Christians and Muslims:

“…Assam Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the root cause was a programme of “ethnic cleansing” implemented by the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), a rebel group fighting for an independent tribal homeland.

“They want to drive out all non-Bodos from the area… it’s a systematic pogrom,” Sarma told IANS.

The NDFB, which is a largely Christian outfit, entered into a ceasefire with the Indian government in 2005, but has never renounced its independence struggle.”

Many media reports though have conveniently forgot to mention the word “Christian” and are instead referring to “Ethnic Bodos” or “Bodo Tribals” or a lame “clashes between two communities”…

I will be watching this with interest…and sadness in my heart…

Who is there to cry for the innocents that have been murdered and the lives that have been displaced (1.1 lakh according to official reports)?…or is this something that happened so far away…in such a distant land that all this is merely statistics…and something to be read and forgotten with your next cup of tea?

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