Guwahati, Aug. 28: Buoyed by the peace initiative by a crack unit of Ulfa, Dispur today unveiled its new anti-insurgency strategy: ignore the outfit into oblivion.

Government spokesperson and health and family welfare minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the government has decided not to give “undue importance” to the outfit anymore.

Sarma was reacting to the AGP’s charges that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his two-day visit to the state did not accord any importance to the insurgency problem in the state.

He said the Prime Minister’s indifference was part of a strategy not to give too much importance to the issue as it would have given unnecessary publicity to the outfit.

“The chief minister has made it very clear that instead of harping on Ulfa, we should concentrate on development. Even the people of Assam, particularly the new generation, has become allergic to the outfit’s name,” Sarma said.

“We can kill militancy through development,” Sarma added, pointing out that it was precisely why the state government in its memorandum to the Prime Minister also referred to Ulfa in the last paragraph.

The government’s strategy apparently stemmed from its new-found confidence in tackling the vexed Ulfa issue after the two companies of the outfit’s most potent 28 battalion came out of the jungles to smoke the peace pipe.