“Jatiya Nayak” returns to his origins and engages in combat with two former AASU leaders
When the Dibrugarh seat goes to polls on April 19, it will be a contest between two erstwhile giants of the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), Sarbananda Sonowal and his much younger, Lurinjyoti Gogoi.
The BJP candidate and Union minister, Sonowal (61), gained the moniker “Jatiya Nayak” (National Hero) in 2005 after the Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunals) Act was overturned by the Supreme Court on the basis of a petition he had filed. At that time, he was a member of the Asom Gana Parishad, which served as the springboard for his political career. Many people believed that the Act was significantly biased in favor of Bangladeshi illegal immigrants.
The prominent member of the Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP), Gogoi (44), is engaged in a legal dispute about the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA). In actuality, this movement in 2020 gave rise to his AJP.
Manoj Dhanowar of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is the third and final candidate in Dibrugarh. It is evident that the constituency is ready for a straight-up struggle between Gogoi and Sonowal.
Sonowal is experiencing a homecoming. In addition to being a native of Dibrugarh, he also won the parliamentary election in 2004 from the Dibrugarh seat and his first Assembly election in 2001 from Moran in the Dibrugarh district.
But he had a bittersweet experience here after losing the 2009 Lok Sabha elections from the Dibrugarh seat. He was elected to the Lok Sabha in 2014 from the nearby Lakhimpur constituency, and he became the chief minister in 2016 after winning the Majuli seat in the Assembly elections.
Gogoi, on the other hand, is a rising leader. Amidst the anti-CAA demonstrations, he ran for office in the 2021 Assembly from the Duliajan and Naharkatia seats, but was unsuccessful in both.
Up until the BJP became a powerful force in 2014, the Dibrugarh seat, which consists of 10 Assembly seats divided between the two upper Assam districts of Dibrugarh and Tinsukia, was held by the Congress.
