Rights workshop condemned ULFA

GUWAHATI, August 2: Sumita Ghose, wife of social worker Sanjoy Ghose, today claimed that a recent workshop on human rights held in Bhubaneswar had passed a resolution condemning the United Liberation Front of Asom's action in abducting Sanjoy Ghose and demanding accountability from them as to his fate and whereabouts. In a faxed statement, Ghose said the workshop, however, passed the resolution against the ULFA with reservations from organisations like Manab Adhikar Sangram Samity (MASS), North East Coordination Committee on Human Rights (NECCOHR) and Human Rights Alert. These organisations did not provide any reason for their reservations. Incidentally, the MASS in a statement yesterday had claimed that the workshop on human rights activities did not pass the resolution put forth by Ghose condemning ULFA for abducting Sanjoy Ghose. Ghose who was allowed to raise her points in the workshop including her painful experience while working in Majuli island as a member of the AVARD-NE led by her husband said, "No one opposed my resolution. But in an underhand way MASS wanted to add a prefix and a suffix to my resolution: 'while we accept the resolution we want to state that in the aftermath of Sanjoy's abduction hundreds of people have been arrested and some killed'." Sumita Ghose said, "What they did not bargain for was that there would be a question raised: who are these hundred people, how are they linked up to Sanjoy's abduction, how come this issue was not raised earlier in the workshop and why should the resolution condemning Sanjoy's abduction be diluted in this manner. Of course, MASS did not have any answers and took refuge in threatening to walk out as their 'credentials' were being ostensibly questioned. And some others from the Northeast, getting increasingly belligerent, were more eager to join them. If it were for the maturity of the organisers and the majority of the other participants, the workshop would have met the same fate as our Parliament has been facing in recent times. But matters were brought under control, and the resolution condemning the ULFA's action was passed with reservations from organisations like MASS, NECCOHR."