As Assam heads to the polls, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma projects the image of an unstoppable leader. He frames his quest for a second term (and the BJP’s third term) as a ‘done deal’, built on welfare schemes and ‘development’. To his followers, he is ‘Mama’ (uncle), but this ground report from Sreenivasan Jain reveals a darker side: the unprecedented weaponisation of illegal immigration to demonise Assam’s Muslims.

While immigration is a long-standing, sensitive issue, Sarma now uses the term ‘Miya’ – a pejorative for Bengali-speaking Muslims – interchangeably........

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