Assam: Nellie massacre reports return to Assembly, reopens a dark chapter written in blood

The wounds of the Nellie massacre—considered the worst incident of communal violence in Assam—resurfaced on Tuesday, 25 November, when the state government placed in the Assembly the reports of two commissions that probed the 1983 killings and the widespread unrest that followed.

On 18 February 1983, more than 2,000 people, mostly Bengali-speaking Muslims, were killed in Nellie and the neighbouring villages of Morigaon district. The attacks unfolded over seven hours and left nearly three lakh people homeless, marking one of the darkest episodes in the state’s history.

The massacre occurred amid the decision to proceed with Assembly elections despite calls for a boycott by the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and the All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad (AAGSP), who were protesting against alleged illegal immigration. The state was under President’s Rule at the time, and tensions had already escalated through police firings in which more than 150 agitators died.

A climate of fear had been created among indigenous groups, including Tiwas, over perceived encroachment on tribal land by immigrants. The immediate trigger, according to available accounts, was a wave of unverified rumours accusing immigrant Muslims of kidnapping and raping four Tiwa women, killing six children, and stealing cattle. There are no FIRs or police records verifying those allegations.

The killings began in Borbori and spread to Nellie and 14 surrounding villages. Survivors have long alleged that the local police either stood by or aided the attackers, and even initially blocked the entry of central forces. The violence ended only with the arrival of CRPF personnel in the evening.

One striking feature of the aftermath was that no one was ever prosecuted. Of the 688 criminal cases filed:

• 378 were closed for “lack of evidence”

• 310 were later withdrawn under the 1985 Assam Accord, ending the six-year agitation

To examine the tragedy, the government formed the T.P. Tewary Commission in 1983, while civil society groups commissioned the T.U. Mehta panel in 1984 after AASU and AAGSP boycotted the official inquiry. Both reports remained out of public access for decades.

On Tuesday, the Himanta Biswa Sarma government placed printed copies of both reports on the MLAs’ desks on the first day of the winter session of the Assembly marking the first time in decades that legislators have been given direct access to the document.

The Commission of Enquiry on Assam Disturbances 1983, headed by retired IAS officer T.P. Tewary, was constituted on 14 July 1983 to examine the eruption of ethnic and political violence during that year. Its final report was submitted to the then Congress government in May 1984.

It was subsequently tabled in the Assembly in 1987 by the AGP-led government, but successive administrations did not circulate the copies widely.

Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has maintained that for years only a single copy of the report remained with the Speaker and that MLAs were never provided with copies for review.

The decision to distribute the report — in both hard and digital form — follows a recent Cabinet resolution by the BJP-led government, of which the AGP is a coalition partner.

As announced earlier, no discussion was held in the House. Sarma has called the move an “academic exercise” to revisit a major chapter of Assam’s history and has repeatedly said that the Tewary report “documents the demographic changes and tensions of that period”.

For many, however, the tabling of the reports has reopened painful memories. Analysts say the resurfacing of the issue is likely to shape Assam’s political landscape ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections, as the findings intersect with long-running debates over identity, immigration and historical injustice.