As the Assam legislative assembly elections draw near, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), under the leadership of the radical Hindutva ideologue Himanta Biswa Sarma, has once again initiated a politics centred on mass violence in the name of Hindutva. As part of this strategy, Sarma has reopened public discussion on the Nellie massacre, one of the largest and most tragic episodes of communal violence bordering genocide in the history of independent India.

This renewed interest, however, is not motivated by remorse regarding the massacre. In the discourse promoted by Sarma, there is no concern for the Bangla Muslim victims, nor any criticism of the Hindu communal tendencies within one stream of the Assam Movement that created the conditions of violence. Such positions are not possible, since the BJP – facing an uncertain electoral outcome – has adopted a more overtly violent and hate-driven Hindutva politics putting even Adityanath’s politics to shame.

For those unfamiliar with Assam’s political history, including younger generations, the Gujarat violence is far more widely remembered, while Nellie is not. In fact, in terms of the number of casualties, the scale of brutality, and the intensity of communal hatred, the 1983 Nellie massacre exceeds the Gujarat violence, the 1984 anti-Sikh pogrom, and several other instances of mass violence. Hence understanding Nelli makes the BJP’s contemporary political intentions more comprehensible and also the role of Congress in furthering it.

Communal circumstances leading to the Nellie massacre

Although the massacre of over 2000 Muslims in Nellie occurred overnight in 1983, the political processes that enabled such violence were shaped by multiple failures of postcolonial democratic governance. While the Congress is primarily responsible, the role of Hindu majoritarian forces, who have historically obstructed the building of a secular, pluralistic Indian republic, was equally significant.

Following the Partition of 1947, the Muslim-majority eastern portion of Bengal became East Pakistan, which later attained independence as Bangladesh in 1971. The sudden creation of borders rendered millions of Bengali Hindus and Muslims as “foreigners,” prompting mass migration into the border states of Assam, West Bengal, and Tripura.

Muslim agrarian communities, who had long engaged in irrigated agriculture in the fertile plains of present-day Bangladesh, were settled – during the British rule – in the plains of Assam and Tripura, where indigenous communities had limited exposure to such agricultural practices. Thus, the new borders became political fault lines. Indian constitutional frameworks institutionalised distinctions: Bengali Hindus migrating into India from East Pakistan were favourably considered as refugees whereas migrants arriving after July 1948 from Pakistan were labelled foreign migrants and later “illegal immigrants”.

The 1971 conflict in East Pakistan triggered another major influx of both Muslims and Hindus into Assam and Tripura. The earlier waves of migration had already generated resentment and anxiety among sections of the local population and the post-1971 influx further altered demographic patterns and increased pressure on land, resources and the polity, turning discontent into anger directed both at migrants and the Union government.

This anger grew into a large anti-immigrant mobilisation. After 1979, under the leadership of the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), the agitation intensified and acquired violent dimensions. Demands grew for detection, detention and deportation of all migrants (both Hindus and Muslims). In the meantime, attacks on Muslim migrant settlements increased.

Also read: A 'Forgotten' Massacre Resurfaces. Its Warnings Echo. Is Anyone Listening?

Simultaneously, longstanding grievances regarding political marginalisation, economic exploitation, and cultural alienation of the Assamese by the Indian state also started getting politically crystallised. The United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) provided ideological leadership, articulating a nationalist demand for Assamese sovereignty that confronted Indian nationalism and the Union government.

The Indira Gandhi-led Congress government, which returned to power in 1980, failed to adopt democratic solutions. Instead of gaining the trust of the movement by addressing legitimate concerns, the government attempted suppression through coercion, internal divisions, and two phases of President’s Rule (1981 and 1982). Amid widespread discontent, the sudden announcement of elections for February 14–20, 1983, further intensified anger toward both the Congress and migrant communities, especially Muslims.

The Nellie massacre

Nellie is a village in the Nagaon district of central Assam. Muslims had been settled there and in neighbouring villages since the 1930s, well before Partition.
The massacre occurred on February 18, 1983, in the thick of ongoing elections. In approximately six to seven hours, more than 2500 Bangla-speaking Muslims from Nellie and seven surrounding villages were brutally massacred by hundreds of individuals from the indigenous Tiwa–Lalung community.

Despite the violence, elections were held. With significant local boycotts, the voter turnout was only about 30%, and Congress returned to power. The government constituted an inquiry commission headed by Justice T. P. Tewari. The Assam Movement continued under student leadership, culminating in the formation of the Asom Gana Parishad government in 1985. Later, Congress again came to power, and since 2016, the BJP has governed the state. Yet, across decades, no government made the Tewari Report public, until the pre-election climate of 2024–25, when Sarma moved to release it.

Understanding the communal motivations behind this political move requires examining the role of communal ideology within the Assam Movement.

'Moderate' Vajpayee calling for the blood of migrants

The Nelli and post-Nelli events especially after the emergence of Hindutva hegemony over the Indian polity illustrate how Hindu majoritarianism – first covert, now overt – has operated within the anti-immigrant movement.

In 1983, the BJP was still organisationally weak, having reconstituted itself from the Janata Party in 1980 as the Bharatiya Janata Party, proclaiming a superficial commitment to “Gandhian socialism”.

While campaigning in Assam for the 1983 elections, A.B. Vajpayee, who is often portrayed by the media as a cultured, poetic, and moderate leader, capitalised on the anti-immigrant sentiment. In his speech, he had said: “Foreigners have come here; and the government does nothing. What if they had come into Punjab instead? People would have chopped them into pieces and thrown them away.”

Communist Party of India (CPI) leader Indrajit Gupta cited this statement in parliament on May 26, 1996, during a debate on a no-confidence motion against Vajpayee’s 13-day government, exposing the BJP’s “liberal” facade. Days after this speech, the Nellie massacre occurred.
A year after the Nelli massacre, BJP and RSS members not only encouraged violence but also directly participated in the anti-Sikh pogrom in Delhi and surrounding areas.

Given this history, Sarma’s motive behind bringing Nellie to the forefront as an electoral issue is quite evident. He does not seek justice for the Muslim victims or punishment for the perpetrators. Notably, in 2004 21 years after the massacre, when a book on Nellie was to be released in Guwahati, the Congress government (of which Sarma was a part) banned the event, claiming it would “reopen old wounds.” Why then reopen those wounds after 42 years?

The purpose behind releasing the Tewari Report

It won't be wrong to suggest that the primary objective behind invoking the Nellie massacre today is to place the Congress in the position of the accused ahead of the assembly election.

Sarma’s government has released both the official Tewari Commission Report and also relaunched the unofficial Mehta Report. The Tewari Report reportedly concludes that the massacre was not linked to the election. The Mehta Report, however, argues that the election, the Indira Gandhi government, and the political context were directly connected to the violence. Thus, the release of these reports seems intended to reopen old wounds and accuse the Congress of leveraging Nellie for electoral gain.

Culpable Congress

It is not only the BJP that has criticised the Congress party. Throughout the Assam Movement, people questioned why the Congress – even under the President’s Rule – insisted on holding an election. The grand old party has still not provided a convincing answer. Moreover, the Congress party’s failure to act against the local perpetrators of violence, while benefiting electorally, reflects its own opportunistic, soft-Hindutva posture.

Also read: Nellie's Survivors Have Waited 42 Years, But Justice Still Fails Them

The political aim is not limited to criticising Congress; it signals that conditions exist for the creation of many new Nellies.

For instance, although the National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise was aimed at identifying "illegal migrants," of the 19 lakh individuals excluded from the list, a substantial number were Hindus. Consequently, the BJP and the RSS abandoned the NRC saying that it has "shortcomings". Similarly, the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls to identify “non-citizens” nationwide has not being inititaed in Assam because many Bangla Hindus – the BJP’s support base – would be categorised as undocumented. Thus, Hindu majoritarianism that once operated covertly now functions systematically. Through disenfranchisement and communal polarisation, the BJP under Sarma has already created political conditions potentially conducive to multiple future Nellie-like events.

Because the perpetrators of the Nellie massacre were never punished, the 1984 anti-Sikh pogrom occurred (while Congress held primary responsibility, RSS groups played a major role). Because justice was not delivered in 1984, the 2002 Gujarat violence followed. Subsequently came the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots, the lynchings of Muslims since 2015, and the 2020 Delhi violence, all follow a similar template and repeat the same patterns.

The difference is that Vajpayee still needed a “moderate” mask while Narendra Modi does not. Society has become so polarised that Vajpayee’s Nellie-era remarks may not strike contemporary Hindu society as objectionable. Communal hatred has become normalised.

While the BJP-RSS fascism is the principal driver, Congress’s opportunistic, power-driven, and soft-Hindutva politics, along with class alliances supporting majoritarianism has also contributed to normalising communal hatred in society.

Indian nationalism to Hindutva majoritarianism

Nellie was the largest massacre in independent India. The Sikh massacre followed the next year. Both were rooted in Congress authoritarianism and its undemocratic articulation of Indian nationalism. Hindu nationalist forces subsequently appropriated the same logic, redefining “Indian” to “Hindu”.

Thus, under Congress, the identities of Assamese, Manipuri, Naga, and Kashmiri peoples were suppressed by the “Indian” military power. Under Modi, they are repressed by both an “Indian” and a “Hindu” military apparatus.

If India had addressed the question of nationality democratically, communalism would not have taken shape. The entire country would not have faced the danger of becoming a graveyard of multiple Nellies.

Even today, the solution remains the same: India and Delhi must relinquish centralised arrogance and authoritarianism and recognise India as a federation of equal nationalities such as Assamese, Kashmiri, Manipuri, Kannada, Tamil, and others.

Shivasundar is a columnist and activist in Karnataka.

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