Initial statements by the Police and Ministers in Assam indicated the role of United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and Harkat-ul Jihad-al Islami (HuJI) in the blasts. However, within a few days, the government had concluded that the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) played a prime role in the explosions with possible help from ULFA. They informed, separately, that the plan for the explosions was finalised in Bangladesh and was put to action by the NDFB cadres. A handful of NDFB cadres were arrested to back the government’s assertion. This conclusion, however, did not prevent the Assam Chief Minister from announcing a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), indicating, albeit indirectly, that the investigators are still groping in the dark. After a few days, another prominent Minister in the Assam Government, indicated the possible role played by a ‘third force’, which operates from outside the country, in the explosions. Surprisingly, there was no mention of HuJI in the latest statement. By all means, the hunt for the perpetrators behind the attack is back to the days of total confusion and also, contradiction.

Blaming Bangladesh or the HuJI, for that matter, is intrinsically linked to the fear psychosis, mostly among the older generation in Assam, who tend to believe in the Brihot (greater) Bangladesh theory, an eternal conspiracy on the part of Bangladesh’s leadership to take over Assam. Frequent citations are made of the book by Sheikh Mujib-ur-Rahman, before the formation of Bangladesh, in which he wrote, “Because Eastern Pakistan must have sufficient land for its expansion and because Assam has abundant forests and mineral resources, coal, petroleum, etc, Eastern Pakistan must include Assam to be financially and economically strong.” In Bangladesh such theories are still alive, but only at a peripheral level. The younger generation in Assam, are definitely a more confident lot and believe that taking over Assam, let alone by Bangladesh, is an un-executable dream.

However, illegal migration from Bangladesh remains an emotive issue in Assam and many have found it convenient to link HuJI with the bourgeoning migrant population who have been accused of dramatically altering the demography in about five of Assam’s 27 districts. HuJI and about five other Islamist militant outfits operating in Assam are said to have found safety and also recruited heavily among such population.

Seriously, however, neither HuJI nor the Islamist militants can be blamed to have carried out the attacks all alone, without significant support from a potent local militant outfit. Although the HuJI has been a common factor behind a number of terrorist attacks in Indian cities in the past few years, its activity in the Northeastern region in general and Assam in particular has been almost negligible. Only in the past couple of months, about nine HuJI cadres were killed in two separate encounters in Goalpara and Dhubri districts of the state. HuJI clearly lacks organisational strength and operational capacities to orchestrate a terrorist attack of the October 30 variety. In addition, involvement of Jihadi forces like the HuJI does not explain the two explosions in Barpeta Road, a predominantly Muslim area. Moreover, the Assam Police, which now claims to be looking at the Jihadi angle to the attack, has always played down the threat of the Islamists in the state. Even the two recent incidents involving the killing of HuJI cadres do not even find mention in the website of the Assam Police.

The NDFB, on the other hand, is an outfit which has been under a ceasefire agreement with the government since 2005. Not a single round of dialogue has taken place between the government and the outfit, in the past three and half years since the outfit came overground. The chairman of the outfit, Ranjan Daimary continues to station himself in Bangladesh and has, more than once, threatened to walk out of the peace process.

It has been speculated in various circles that the NDFB indulged in the attack to hasten the pace of the stalemated peace process with the government. Clearly, such analysis bases itself on the absence of common sense. No outfit, which has chosen unilaterally to opt for a negotiated settlement of its grievances, would do something that would risk derailing the process.

The Assam government’s purported position on the NDFB remains a matter of controversy. It is more than clear that the Congress party, a political partner of the erstwhile BLT, an arch rival of the NDFB, wants to safeguard the interest of its alliance partner. The Bodo People’s Front (BPF), the political avatar of the Bodo Liberation Tigers (BLT), which now controls the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC), is apprehensive of any future deal between the Government and the NDFB. It is the fear of such a deal that had led it to accuse the NDFB of fermenting the Bodo-Muslim clashes in the first week of October in three districts leading to the death of more than 50 persons. The Government, which makes a lot of noise about the NDFB’s role in extortion, abduction and killings, has done little to curb its activities.

The Special Investigation Team (SIT), at the time of writing this piece, was preparing to conduct narco-analysis tests on two of the blast accused- Fhunka Barman and Bimal Mooshahary, both believed to have built up a network of terror modules in various parts of the state before the terror strikes. The police are also looking to arrest four other key accused - George, Rajen Goyari alias Ritikhan, Jitu Daimary and Tarun Boro, who are still absconding. Three of these, apart from Boro, are NDFB cadres. Documents submitted by the police in court said Rajen Goyari alias Ritikhan, ‘commander’ of the NDFB’s 4th battalion, had masterminded the Ganeshguri blast in Guwahati. George had procured the Maruti 800 car used in the explosion through Tarun Boro, who is a taxi driver by profession with alleged NDFB links. The car was bought a month before the blast from Arun Patowary, who is a businessman and resident of Sorbhog in Barpeta. Unverifiable intelligence reports now indicate that ULFA commander-in-chief Paresh Barua and NDFB chairman Ranjan Daimary had met thrice in Bangladesh before the Assam blasts. The last meeting between the two was held at Cox’s Bazar on September 17 in the presence of a foreign intelligence operative.

Going by the findings of the investigations so far, it is possible that the some of the NDFB cadres had participated in the attacks. However, it is still early to point at the outfit’s role as the prime conspirator behind the blasts. NDFB’s over-ground status has led to the presence of a lot of its cadres in the Bodo heartland areas. ULFA, in the past, has used mercenaries (school children and unemployed youth) to plant explosives and it could also be possible that on this occasion, it has used the skilled, yet unemployed NDFB cadres, to execute its plan. For obvious reasons, participation of skilled non-ULFA cadres would have been a necessity to organise and orchestrate sophisticated attacks of this nature.

It is rather surprising, that the investigators have continued to leave the ULFA outside the ring of suspicion as a primary player in the explosions. Two denials by the outfit, in which the ULFA blamed the ‘occupation forces’ and also the Rashtriya Sawam Sevak Sangh (RSS) for the explosions, has been taken rather seriously. This is further logic defying because of the fact that the outfit has detonated explosions of this nature in the past and is known to possess RDX, TNT and other plastic explosives. ULFA has used explosive laden bicycles, motorcycles and cars to set off blasts on previous occasions. Significantly, all the four districts that were chosen for the serial attacks on October 30 are known ULFA strongholds. Moreover, almost all the locations where explosives were detonated, including the specific locations in Dispur-Guwahati, barring the District Judge’s Court premises, have been targeted by ULFA in the past.

Too much emphasis has been placed on the present debility of ULFA to argue that the outfit, being at its weakest since its inception, is operationally incapable of carrying out an attack of this scale, particularly after the defection and surrender of two companies of its principal strike force, the ‘28th battalion.’ While it is certainly the case that the ‘28th battalion’s’ defection and engagement with the Government has had a significant impact on ULFA’s capacities, other formations, including the ‘27th battalion’ and the ‘709th battalion,’ are largely intact. Crucially, the weakness of the ‘28th battalion’ has led to a significant reduction of the outfit’s activities in the eastern-most (Upper Assam) districts of the state. But, no visible decline in the capacities of the other two battalions has been noticed. The ‘27th battalion’s’ activities have primarily remained confined to the hill districts of Karbi Anglong and NC Hills and this formation is not known to have carried out any attacks in Dispur-Guwahati or any of the other locations which witnessed explosions on October 30. On the other hand, the ‘709th battalion’ has, in the past, executed past operations both in Dispur-Guwahati as well as in the districts of Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon and Barpeta, where the recent serial explosions occurred. It is, thus, possible that the 709th battalion, which operates with steady support from Bangladesh where the top ULFA leadership is based, was the primary executing agency behind the present serial blasts, which have been concentrated significantly in its areas of operation. A major strike was, moreover, almost a dire necessity for ULFA, to demonstrate its surviving capacities in the eyes of both sympathisers and detractors, who are increasingly inclined to write the outfit off.

Terrorism, in the end, is a mind game. A terrorist outfit lives and attracts attention through a regime of fear. Its activities depend critically on the constant demonstration of such capacities. The serial blasts were perhaps the best response that the outfit could think of.

ULFA is not a dying force, not yet. As in the past, the outfit still retains significant strength to bounce back. Such revival has, mostly, been aided by the adhocish and directionless policies of the Assam Government, who appear eager to provide it with a fresh lease of life, every time ULFA looks down and out. Recent reports have indicated that both the ULFA and the Khaplang faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN-K) are holding joint training sessions in the Lohit, Tirap and Changlang districts of Arunachal Pradesh. ULFA, according to the report, has managed to recruit cadres from Arunachal Pradesh.

The outfit is trying to overcome the setbacks it received through the surrender of the A and C companies of the 28th battalion. If recent incidents are any indication, the outfit’s remaining cadres in charge of upper Assam district are busy putting in place a series of activities to reinforce their nuisance value.

There are enough signs that the explosions and their after effects have slowly started fading away from public memory. Newspapers, which devoted pages of reports and analyses on the explosions and its victims, have relegated the related reports to the inside pages, as if the people, to quote a rather familiar expression, “have learnt to take in their strides.” Nothing is destined to change in the state, except for the lives of the people who lost their near and dear ones.

What if the Assam Government is to finally conclude that the NDFB was the prime conspirator behind the attacks? Will it abandon the peace process with the outfit and risk the resumption of militancy in the Bodo heartland? Will it rely on the BLT to counter the nuisance potential of the NDFB cadres? Possibly not. What if ULFA is found to be primarily involved in the explosions? The Government is in no position to bring the guilty to book. It would possibly lead to some popular backlash against the outfit. But without the government willing to convert the popular feelings into a large-scale movement against the outfit, ULFA would find it easy to tide over such a backlash.

Assam, by all means, will have to repeatedly demonstrate its “undying spirit” in the face of the official incapacity to rein in terror.