MY ABORTED ASSAM TRIP
Vipin Tripathi
Friends,
I left Anand Vihar (Delhi) on August 14 at 6:50 AM by North east express to go to Kokrajhar. The train went alright up to Mughal Sarai. 1 hr. from there we reached Dildar Nagar, 2 hr. behind schedule. It was 9 PM. The train stayed there up to 3 AM. The station master told us, “There is heavy rain and flood in Patna, hence all the stations from there to Patna (120 km) are crowded with trains. It may take several hours after the passage in Patna is cleared.” I got apprehensive about rain in Korajhar and Baxa also. Hence at 4 AM I took Brahmaputra Mail back to Delhi and reached Delhi at 8:30 PM. I felt deeply sad to abandon the trip.
Minutes before coming out of the North East Express, I talked to an army man from Punjab, who was positioned in Guwahati. When I told him the purpose of my trip to visit the village in Baxa district where carnage took place in May 2014, he told me that the day killings of 48 people took place by Bodo Militants, he was there. His army team reached the village with in hours of the carnage. He said the militants were very cruel. They pulled apart the legs of a girl, squeezed a baby. It was horrible. How could people live under such dreadful fear? He told that militants killed two army men too some time ago, took out their eyes and buried them in soil.
With these thoughts I boarded the train to Delhi. The general class unreserved compartment was very crowded yet I found a corner on a bench. Before reaching Delhi I gave pamphlets, “Shram ke masiha Bhagwan Krishna, Prabhu Isha and Prophet Mohammad” to fellow travellers. They read every word of it.
Today I have sent Rs. 68,000 to Sahjuddin, Principal Duramari High School as salaries of Science/ Maths teacher (a Rajbanshi Hindu) and English teacher (a Muslim). This completes 13 months of support (@ Rs. 8,500 per month) to this school as against the commitment of one year that I had made to them. I also sent Rs. 3500 to Hajir Ali whose wife is studying in BA II year.
Duramari High school at present has 28 students in IX and 18 in X. A batch of 11 students appeared in Xth Board in 2014. Of these 5 passed. The result is disheartening. But I hope it will improve.
With the expenditure mentioned above and other expenses (Rs. 28,000 People Centric Nationalism book, Rs. 10,000 patrika, Rs. 23,000 Madarsa teachers workshop, Rs. 8000 election fliers, Rs. 4000 Krishna, Isha, Mohammad fliers etc.) we have consumed all the money friends contributed in January 2014 and are left with negative balance of Rs. 60,000.
I request you to order People centric book for yourself and for distribution/ sale.
Today I read PM’s speech in the newspaper, what a contrast in ground realities and superfluous utopia. No concern for security, dignity and living realities of the masses and the undercurrent of poison being injected by his supporters.
[August 16, 2014: tripathivipin@yahoo.co.in]
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