Mitra Phukan is a well-known Assamese writer and contributes regularly to prominent English dailies in Assam. She is the author of a number of books for children and has recently edited a collection of Assamese short stories. She is a committed member of the North East Writers' Forum and edites their journal, NEWFrontiers.
The Assam students' agitation of the 1970s and 1980s has grown into a full-blown agitation today with kidnappings, extortions, and political instability being the order of the day. The meaninglessness of the violence, the complexities that divide "them" and "us" and the point at which the two merge are all explored here and the final denouement is horrifying and yet true -- for there can be no other end to such a tale, where the personal is so densely interwoven with the political.