At a time when the state seemed to be starting to nurture the expectation that this time the run-up to PR and Municipal polls might be free from violence, the arson and vandalism of an unimaginable scale that took place on Friday morning in Vijoynagar will come as a rude shock. The incident has received wide coverage in all-India media and it’s unfortunate that poll-bound Arunachal Pradesh has received national attention yet another time for wrong reason, like that in 2019 when there was bloodshed which took away eleven lives including a sitting MLA. Thankfully, this time no life was lost as public properties were the targets of the irate mob.
It’s difficult to comprehend why violence of such magnitude erupted at a time when talks are on to resolve the lingering issue of participation of non-APSTs in local body elections, particularly the one that relates to Vijoynagar. Earlier this month, a hunger strike launched by two student unions were withdrawn after Home Minister Bamang Felix intervened and reportedly there was a general understanding that since the issue of deletion of non-APST settlers names from the PR electoral roll of Vijoynagar is a time-consuming process involving a slew of official procedures, patience needs to be exercised. And it was certainly not the case that the state government has said the issue will not be attended, rather, the path to deliberations is actually wide open with stakeholders free to air their opinions. Sensing correctly that the issue has reached a contentious stage, the State Election Commission too deferred the PR polls in Vijoynagar to avoid any further wrangling. But still, the unwarranted incident couldn’t be avoided and the way the systematic rampage was engineered, prima facie it gives a hint that prior planning might have preceded the ‘action’. While the onus is now on the state government to unearth the ‘behind the scene’ activities and bring the ‘actors’ to book, a couple of questions are bound to arise. First, why there was no security firewall beforehand in Vijoynagar given the fact that tension over the issue was simmering there for at least a month and second, that of intelligence gathering and the usage thereto, an indispensable aspect of statecraft, based on which pre-emptive steps are usually rolled out. While all these need a relook now, in terms of loss that was incurred due to destruction of public assets, for the state in general and Vijoynagar in particular where roads and all basic essentials of life are still dreams, it’s huge.
While it’s desirable that law be allowed to take its own course, the culture of making public assets the soft targets to articulate any demand, justified or otherwise, must end at once in state.

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Kenter Joya Riba

(Managing Editor)
      She is a graduate in Science with post graduation in Sociology from University of Pune. She has been in the media industry for nearly a decade. Before turning to print business, she has been associated with radio and television.
Email: kenterjoyaz@easternsentinel.in / editoreasternsentinel@gmail.com
Phone: 0360-2212313

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