ON OCTOBER 30 2008, serial bomb blasts rocked Assam causing more than 60 deaths and leaving more than 300 people seriously injured. These victims were all common people, with a majority being daily wage earners. It was a horrible nightmare for almost all Assamese, an experience which battered the psyche of conscious citizens. Many families lost their sole earning members and in some cases that member was so badly injured that they became a burden for their family as the expenses for their treatment were considerable.

Though the state government arranged a chain of press meets where they declared that necessary steps have been taken to compensate the families of the dead and also to bear the treatment expenses of the injured, in reality, this did not happen. Many families were ruined. Why do only the common people have to pay for the political games of the country?

Everybody remembered the image of Bijoya Chakraborty (presently a member of parliament from Guwahati) carrying an injured or dead person in a pulling cart to the State Secretariat. My question is that what was Chakraborty's primary duty - a) To take the person immediately to the hospital? Or b) To carry his body as a symbol of the damage done by the blast.

It is such politicians who create a platform for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. All the leaders of the political parties came to Guwahati and some of them, like LK Advani even went to the extent of asking for votes, claiming that if they won, they would ensure that such carnage did not occur again. Tarun Gogoi, the chief minister, called the blast a normal blast which happens in all parts of the country saying, “ What's new in it? Bomb blasts are happening in Delhi, Mumbai also. We are taking adequate preventive measures.”

The media was also very active those days, covering all nooks and corners of the blast areas as well as the stories of the victims. Immediately after the blast, the people of Assam came openly to the streets lighting candles for the eternal peace of the dead and immediate recovery of the injured. However, several months later, no one has come to support the families of the victims.

There is no media coverage of them and there are no politicians or intellectuals, flocking to meet them. The outcome of these incidents is always horrible, but it is only experienced by the victims and nobody else. The victims were still there waiting for something, but the politicians have realised their goal. How long will the common people have to pay with their blood?