Gaurav Gogoi on Assam CM’s ‘Snooping’ Allegations: ‘Nothing But A Cover for His Illegal Activities’

New Delhi: In his first public remarks on the allegations levelled by Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma over the past few months, Congress MP and the party’s newly appointed Assam president Gaurav Gogoi on Wednesday (May 28) said that the smear campaign launched against him is being used as a “cover” to “purchase some kind of a shield or obfuscate the illegal activities that he has been indulging in via his own family.”

Gogoi refuted Sarma’s allegations against his wife Elizabeth, of having links with Pakistan’s ISI, and accused him of making a plot of a “C-grade Bollywood movie that has been given a release date of September 10, which will flop miserably”. While Gogoi said that his wife had worked in Pakistan for a year in 2011 and that he had visited her once in 2013, he questioned why the Union government has not probed the matter in the last 11 years that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been in power.

In response to a question by The Wire at a press conference in New Delhi, Gogoi said that Sarma “has used his family to amass ill-gotten wealth and huge properties.”

“This smear campaign against my family is nothing but a cover that the chief minister of Assam wants to bring on the activities of his own family. The chief minister of Assam has used his family to amass ill-gotten wealth and huge properties. This is something we have stated previously, as well as how members of his family are heading 17 companies and getting government contracts. This smear campaign is to purchase some kind of a shield or obfuscate the illegal activities that he has been indulging in via his own family,” he said.

“We have laid out the facts about my wife's role in the public policy sector. I have laid out the facts relating to my personal visit eleven years ago to Pakistan. When it comes to questions relating to the citizenship of my family, I believe that is a very private and personal matter, but the facts are now out here. It is up to the chief minister if he has found something illegal to make it public. We want the chief minister to focus on the real issues of Assam because that is definitely what we will do.”

On Monday, May 26, the Congress threw the gauntlet to the BJP and Sarma by naming Gogoi as the Assam Congress president. Gogoi, who is the party's deputy leader in the Lok Sabha, is seen as a strong opposition voice in parliament and has been locked in a war of words with Sarma in recent months over the latter's allegations against his wife that she colluded with Pakistan's ISI. Gogoi's appointment is being seen as a direct challenge to Sarma ahead of next year’s assembly elections.

“About 14-15 years ago, my wife, who is a well-known public policy specialist, worked on an international project that was working on climate change in South Asia. In 2011, she spent one year in Pakistan on this project and returned to India in 2012-13. And in 2015, she took another job. About 11-12 years ago, in 2013, I went once with her,” said Gogoi on Wednesday, providing a timeline for the first time on the allegations levelled by Sarma.

“Their job is defamation, so they are using (this) to make a C-grade Bollywood movie which has been given a release date of September 10, and it will be a flop,” said Gogoi.

The Sarma government has formed an SIT (Special Investigation Team) to probe the allegations against Gogoi, which will complete its investigation on September 10.

“If my wife or I have done anything wrong, then whose government has it been for the last 11 years? Everyone knows the kind of investigations that are done if anyone crosses the border. I am an opposition leader and speak freely in the House. What has the government been doing for the last 11 years?” he said.

Gogoi takes charge of the Assam Congress as the party looks to revive its fortunes after a decade of the BJP retaining the government in the state. Sarma, a former Congress leader himself, and Gogoi are seen as bitter rivals, with the chief minister having led a heated campaign against him in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections when the Congress MP contested from Jorhat after delimitation in the state, instead of his earlier constituency of Kaliabor. 

While the Congress won only three of Assam's 14 Lok Sabha seats, it was Gogoi's win in Jorhat which was seen as a victory due to the chief minister's campaign against him in the constituency. Since then, the Congress has, however, lost all five seats in by-elections held last year and recorded a poor show in recent panchayat elections.

Gogoi said that by naming him as the new Assam Congress president, Sarma’s efforts to create doubts in the minds of the Congress leadership have failed.

“Assam chief minister's various personal attacks that he has been making against me, I want to thank him. There was an impression among the people that my political role is limited to the national arena, and I have a lesser role in Assam. But through delimitation in which only my Lok Sabha constituency was divided into two, and the kind of allegations that he has been levelling in recent months, he himself has raised my stature,” he said.

“At the same time, I would like to thank my party leadership because the chief minister was looking to make allegations that would create doubts in my party's leadership's minds about me. I thank my party leadership for not falling for the chief minister's tactics and for supporting me.”

Shortly after Gogoi’s remarks, Sarma hit back and said that the Congress MP had “finally admitted that he had visited Pakistan”.

“Let us be very clear – this is just the beginning, not the end. What lies ahead is far more serious. There exists every reasonable ground, supported by credible inputs and documented information, to suggest that Shri Gogoi has maintained proximity with the Pakistani establishment,” Sarma said.

Addressing a press conference later, Sarma said that Gogoi made the admission deliberately after becoming Assam Congress president “because he knows September 10 is coming.”

Sarma said that his allegations against Gogoi have “nothing to do with elections but about national security and Bharat” and accused the Congress MP’s wife of snooping on the Intelligence Bureau (IB).

“His wife was snooping on our IB, and I have documents to prove that. Taking advantage of Tarun Gogoi’s (former Assam chief minister and Gogoi’s father) position, they crafted their role within our Indian establishment. It was snooping on behalf of a particular climate activist group,” said Sarma.

The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.