Ajit Mahanta?s wife Kadami and their two sons in front of a relative?s house at Hunjan village. Pictures by Ritu Parna Dutta

Kakopathar, March 30: Looking at the signposts with messages like ?Speed thrills but kills? along the border road that cuts through Kakopathar, one half expects another warning ? ?Inflammable, handle with care? ? at the entrance to this lately volatile town in Tinsukia district of Upper Assam.

But far from being the tinderbox it is supposed to be, Kakopathar appears almost passive. It is on entering one of the villages on either side of the highway leading to Arunachal Pradesh that a feeling of disquiet strikes with a sudden impact. There is suspicion in the eyes of the residents, never mind the occasional disarming smile and the customary tamol-paan (betelnut and leaf) offering.

This is apparently not the ideal time to seek favours ? least of all votes ? in the hub of protests against alleged army excesses in Assam. Intuitive as they are, politicians and party workers are steering clear of an area that now revolts at the slightest hint of administrative aggression.

In Dirak Gossaingaon, under forest minister Pradyut Bordoloi?s Margherita constituency, an elderly man declares that nobody would dare to ?play political games? there after what happened last month. He is, of course, referring to the crisis that began with the alleged extra-judicial killing of daily wage-earner Ajit Mahanta, intensified with eight deaths in firing by government forces on protesters and snowballed into an explosion of anger that has not ebbed since.

Kakopathar town, which is a part of the easternmost constituency of Sadiya, and residential pockets adjacent to the main road are the only places where the hurly-burly of electioneering is visible. Dirak Gossaingaon, where Ajit and his family used to live, and most of the other villages that participated in the protests are as mentally distant from the polls as Sadiya is geographically apart from Pancharatna at the other end of Assam.

?No, we are not boycotting the elections but we aren?t willing to get caught in the electoral whirligig either. There are more important issues for us to handle at this point in time,? says Bipul Baibhab Baruah, one of those being allegedly hounded by the police for inciting trouble. Bipul has just led yet another road blockade, this one over the death of a youth in police firing in Lakhimpur. ?There will be a rebellion here whenever the government tries to silence us, either by force or with money,? warns his compatriot Durgeswar Kalita.

Deep inside Hunjan village, to which Ajit?s family recently migrated from Dirak Gossaingaon, the ?Jatiya Swahid?s? widow is slowly mending her life. Kadami Mahanta has a peon?s job in the Tinsukia deputy commissioner?s office, Rs 7 lakh (paid by the government and the army) in the bank and a tiny pucca house being built by the very forces in whose custody her husband died.

Mention the word ?election? and Kadami even manages a wry smile. ?So you have come to ask me which party I am supporting?? she quizzes.

Her query answered, she smiles again before mumbling: ?Nejaanu naam aase ne nai (I don?t know whether my name is on the voters? list).?

Back in Kakopathar town, Babul Ahmed is sitting in his small shop, explaining why he refused the Rs 3 lakh offered by the government as compensation for the death of his wife Wahida in the police firing on February 10. ?I did so because I didn?t want anybody to fix a price for my wife?s life. Some functionaries of the Assam United Democratic Front came calling soon after and asked me to join the party, thinking I would be their election mascot. I showed them the door.?

This is obviously not the ideal time to seek favours ? least of all political support ? from the many angry Ahmeds in and around Kakopathar.