In Assam’s history, the Mughals find reference mainly as the invading enemy—pushed back 18 times, culminating in the 1671 Battle of Saraighat when the invaders were dealt the final humiliating defeat by the Ahom empire. The hero was Ahom general Lachit Barphukan, whose legend straddles history and folklore. Another soldier stood out in that victory—Barphukan’s lieutenant Bagh Hazarika aka Ismail Siddique, an Assamese Muslim who commanded 1,000 men. It was them and more before them who made certain that Mughal footprints on Assam were hardly any and for very brief periods. And that is the reason many in the state were left bemused when chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal claimed recently that “attacks of Mughals on Assam continues” to this day.

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Grand conspiracy theories and even grander promises abound during elections. “But even I must say that this Mughal attack reference was a bit too much,” says a BJP leader who doesn’t wish to be named. “There is not a single Mughal monument in Assam. There is no reference to destruction of any Hindu places of worship by Mughals in our state unlike in other parts of the country. Which Mughal was he referring to?” the leader questions. The BJP’s rationale? “The reference to Mughals is not about any person but a mindset…which is against India, against Assam,” says state BJP spokesperson Ritu Baran Sarma.

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And the story of the BJP’s tried-and-tested tactics of using polarisation as a tool begins. In 2016, when the party won for the first time in Assam, it scratched the old wound, “illegal immigration”, and dangled the National Register of Citizens bait to woo the majority—the Assamese-speaking voters. Five years later, and after the NRC revision didn’t go the way it would have liked, the BJP has virtually dumped the issue of “illegal immigration”. The final number of exclusions in the NRC—just over 19 lakh—was far less than the projected number of “Bangladeshis” and it included many Hindus, whom the BJP had vowed to protect. It has also gone silent on the CAA, which sparked anger and violence across the state in 2020.

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But, facing stiff challenge from a Congress-led eight-party alliance that includes the AIUDF, the BJP has singled out perfume baron/MP Badruddin Ajmal as Enemy No. 1 of Assam. For the BJP, it’s time to unroll the “Oxomiya versus Miya” plank. In Assam, Miya is a derogatory reference to Bengali-speaking Muslims of East Pakistan/Bangladesh origin. Minister and BJP strategist Himanta Biswa Sarma says the “Miyas never tried to assimilate” with the Assamese. The BJP is trying to portray Ajmal as the leader of the Miyas and, thus, against Assam’s language and culture.

The Congress scoffs. “The BJP has no issues left now…It cannot ask people to vote for the NRC, neither for CAA. Nothing to speak of development either. So it has gone back to polarising the elections. But it will not work this time. The people have seen through its agenda,” says Congress MP Gaurav Gogoi. The Congress-led alliance is banking heavily on anti-CAA anger and consolidation of Muslim votes against the BJP. The alliance is hoping that the combination of anti-BJP Hindu votes and the Muslim support to Ajmal’s AIUDF will be enough to slice up the BJP’s social engineering.

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If that’s not enough, the party hopes that Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka’s visits to temples and naamghars—Vaishnavite prayer halls—would be enough to woo Hindu voters for whom religious identity is as important as their Assamese credentials.

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