From: Mantu Baishya
5104 N 140th Street, Omaha, NE 68164
Subject: Assam2004
Dear Friends,
I am writing to you today to bring you up-to-date on
Assam2004, the proposed annual Joint conference for
the year 2004. As you know, the Assamese community
in North America has been coming together for a joint
conference once a year during the weekend of July
Fourth. As a tradition started in 1999, the joint
conferences have brought together the diverse
Assamese community under a single roof. After nearly
twenty years of divisions in the community, these joint
conferences have helped alleviate many of the
differences that earlier contributed to each segment of
May 2004
the society celebrating its own individual
conference. The community has also adopted a neutral,
non-partisan name for the event, which has become
one of the most important hallmarks that demonstrates
the unity of the community and the compromises each
organization made to attain this unity. The first joint
conference was held in Houston, Texas in 1999 named
as “20th Assam Convention/26th Assam Day (The
Houston Convention 1998)”. Since then, New Jersey:
“Assam Conference”, Toronto: “Assam 2001”,
Denver: “Assam 2002” and St. Louis “Assam 2003”
have hosted successful joint conferences.
For the year 2004, the California Assamese community
first made an invitation during Assam 2002 in Denver.
ASA accepted the invitation and AANA mentioned that
they will give due consideration for the invitation.
Based on this acceptance, the California community
began making preparations for hosting the conference.
However, during Assam 2003 in St. Louis, a group of
individuals from the Texas area decided to hold the
conference in Austin, Texas. The reason forwarded by
the Texas members was that the California community
lacked "credibility" to host an Assamese conference.
This accusation was of course not fair and without any
merit, not to mention that this was an insult to the
California community. However, the Texas individuals
were adamant that the next conference be held in
Austin, Texas.
Assam Society of America, for the benefit of the
Assamese community decided to have the joint
conference in Texas based on the resolution that the
conference would be a "Joint Convention", and would
be co-sponsored by ASA, AANA, and other Assamese
organizations, with each organization participating as
an equal member. However, once the Texas individuals
started preparations for the conference, it slowly
became obvious that the group (which had by now
elected a Host Committee of solely AANA members),
were preparing to host a conference for the benefit
AANA only. The first and most obvious of the
indications was that they named the conference
"Assam Convention", which was going back to the
partisan way of naming conferences of the past.
Obviously, this was not acceptable to ASA.
During the following months, members of the
Assamese community have discussed the matter with
the Texas Committee. All that the discussion ended up
was a rigid stance of non-cooperation. I am extremely
sorry to say that three months of discussion and
persuasion could not bring any useful conclusion. The
Texas Committee is fully aware that their decision will
have far-reaching consequences, including the
foreseeable risk that the Assamese community will
once again fracture, which in turn will lead to separate
conferences. Yet they are adamant.
In spite of the inflexible stand of the Texas Committee,
other members of the ASA executive committee and I
had still hoped that they would eventually
accommodate to our legitimate and fair views. We held
on to this hope until this past week. However, during
the past week, the Texas committee has mailed
invitations to Assam Convention, and not to the Joint
Convention that we had hoped to attend. At this point,
I see no reason to continue hoping any longer.
Therefore, together with other members of ASA, I am
faced with an extremely difficult decision to make. It
would be unfair to attend the Texas Convention under
such unfair circumstances.
The alternative left for us is to have a separate get
together for us. However, this will ruin the all the good
work our moderate members have done since 1999 to
put all the groups together. I am very hopeful that in
future years we will have a host committee that is
accommodating and eager to see the whole Assamese
community under one roof. By not going to Austin, we
will definitely miss our annual fun-filled event, but we
would not sit down and lament on it. ASA Executives
and I are proposing a few community service projects
in Assam. Assam Society of America already sponsors
several projects such as the “Adopt A Child” program,
the “ASA Scholarship”s programs and “Save Our
Culture” program. Perhaps, we could contribute some
of the money we would have spent on attending the
conference towards these projects.
I have discussed this option with the Executive
Committee and other members of the community. They
have been very receptive of the idea. At this time, we
still have to work out the details such as which projects
to undertake and how best to manage them. However,
before we proceed, I wanted to let you know and
request your support. While I realize that not attending
the conference will have some consequences, I hope
you will agree with me that this is the moral thing to
do. It is the wise thing to do if we are to hope that in
future years we will be able to again come together as
a community in spite of the polarizing intentions of a
few stubborn individuals. In the next few days, I will
attempt to discuss this proposition with more members
of the community and finalize a plan about how we can
undertake these projects. If you have any suggestions
or wish to discuss the proposal, please feel free to
email me at mcbaishya@hotmail.com or to call me at
(402) 397-2283. In the meantime, I hope that I can
count on your support not only to make our projects
successful, but to also send a strong message to the
Texas Committee that their actions will have
consequences.
Mantu Baishya,
President, Assam Society of America
mcbaishya@hotmail.com
Omaha, Nebraska, April 25, 2004
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