Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday said that a college student was arrested last month because she allegedly wanted to join the banned United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent), and not for her “anti-national poem”, reported The New Indian Express.
“The girl was not arrested for writing a poem,” Sarma told reporters. “If she had not been arrested, she would have gone to the ULFA(I). How can we allow her to do so? If she goes to the ULFA(I), she will return as a human bomb and kill us.”
Barshashree Buragohain was arrested on May 18 after the police filed a case against her for a Facebook post she made a day before. She has been booked under provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. Buragohain is a second-year Bachelor of Science student at the DCB Girls College in Jorhat.
The first information report said that Buragohain had written in Assamese “Swadhin xurujor dixe akou ekhuj, Akou korim rashta druh” (One more step toward the sun of freedom, once again, I will commit treason).
This was [an] implicit endorsement of the United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent) and pointed towards a larger “criminal conspiracy” and “intent to wage war against the Indian government”, the FIR said.
On Thursday, Sarma claimed that before Buragohain was arrested, she had told the police that she would go to the United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent).
“We have to save her,” the chief minister said. “Forty-two boys and girls died in the ULFA(I) camps. What if she also gets killed there? We have to think of her. She is being counselled. I sent people to the jail this morning to talk to her.”
He added that the 19-year-old would be released if she and her parents gave an undertaking that she would not go to the banned outfit.
The chief minister’s statement came after the college student’s father Ajit Buragohain urged Sarma to release her. On Wednesday, the girl’s mother Usha Buragohai also sought relief, saying that her daughter’s examinations will begin on July 16.
“You have kept her in jail because of writing a poem,” she had said. “This is totally injustice. Her study life has been finished and as the exam is from July 16, we demand immediate bail for my daughter. I know my daughter and she doesn’t have that kind of mindset.”
Meanwhile, the Golaghat court in Assam on Thursday allowed Barshashree Buragohain to appear for her examinations, reported The Hindu. The court then asked the jail authorities to provide sufficient police escort from the jail to her examination centre.
Following demands for her release this week, the police denied that the student had been arrested for writing an anti-national poem.
Assam Special Director General of Police (law and order) GP Singh had tweeted that Buragohain was arrested as there was a “specific call to indulge in waging war against the state” in her Facebook post.
“When someone publicly professes support for a banned organisation and declares the intent of waging war against the Indian state, we are legally bound to prosecute that person,” Singh had tweeted. “Following due process, chargesheet shall be filed in competent court of law. Let the law take its own [course].”
Assam Director General of Police Bhaskar Jyoti Mahanta had told reporters that Buragohain had written she was going to join the United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent) and was also luring others to join the banned outfit.
While Buragohain had not mentioned the United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent) directly in her poem, her counsel, A Dihingia, had said: “The post has been linked to the outfit because it mentioned ‘sun’ – which is the symbol of the ULFA(I).”
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