Dibrugarh: For Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) president Lurinjyoti Gogoi, the newly constituted Khowang assembly constituency in Dibrugarh district is not just another election — it is perhaps the most defining contest of his political life.The poster boy of Assam’s historic anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) agitation, Gogoi has inspired thousands on the streets but has never tasted electoral victory. On Apr 9, he gets another — and arguably his best — chance to change that.
48-year-old Gogoi is pitting himself against BJP’s Chakradhar Gogoi, a two-time MLA from the now-abolished Moran assembly seat, in what is shaping up to be the headline battle of the Khowang constituency. Prabhakar Das of JMM and Independent candidate Biju Dowarah — a former Congress leader who chose to contest independently after Congress ceded the seat to its ally AJP — are the other candidates in the fray.The anti-CAA movement had made Lurinjyoti Gogoi, a former general secretary of the All Assam Students’ Union (Aasu) a household name across Assam, yet the electoral arena has remained elusive. In the 2021 assembly elections, he contested simultaneously from both Duliajan and Naharkatia seats but finished third in both — polling 24,192 votes in Duliajan and 25,232 votes in Naharkatia — as BJP swept both constituencies. Creditable performances, but far from victory.“Khowang is my mission, not merely my election. The people of this constituency — the tea garden workers, the farmers, the youth — deserve a voice that truly fights for them, not one that serves Delhi’s agenda. I have fought for Assam’s identity on the streets and I will continue that fight inside the assembly,” said Gogoi on Thursday.Khowang constituency is dominated by the Ahom community and tea garden voters. The Ahom community, to which Gogoi himself belongs, accounts for a substantial share of around 49,000 voters, or roughly 31% of the electorate. Tea garden voters constitute approximately 46,000 — around 29.5% — of Khowang’s total electorate of 1,57,363 voters, making them an indispensable bloc. Crucially, no candidate from the tea community is contesting from Khowang this time, leaving that sizeable vote potentially in play.His BJP rival, Chakradhar Gogoi, is no pushover. Also from the Ahom community, he is a seasoned legislator who first stunned the political establishment in 2016 by defeating Congress heavyweight and former Union minister Paban Singh Ghatowar from Moran by 16,231 votes, and then retained the seat in 2021 by defeating Ghatowar’s son Pranjal Ghatowar by a margin of 22,341 votes. A significant portion of the erstwhile Moran constituency now forms part of the new Khowang seat, giving Chakradhar Gogoi a natural base and familiarity with a large section of the electorate.However, Chakradhar Gogoi’s record as Moran MLA is not without blemishes. Several roads in the former constituency remain incomplete or in poor condition, and infrastructure gaps, including substandard bridges have drawn criticism from locals. It is precisely these vulnerabilities that Lurinjyoti and the AJP are hoping to capitalise on.Significantly, at least seven BJP ticket aspirants had staked a claim for the Khowang seat before Chakradhar Gogoi finally secured the nomination — a sign of internal competition that AJP is watching closely.The Congress-AJP electoral alliance works in Lurinjyoti’s favour this time, ensuring he does not split votes with Congress. With the Ahom vote divided between two community candidates and the tea vote up for grabs, the arithmetic is tighter than it looks.The streets of Assam know Lurinjyoti’s voice well. Whether the ballot boxes of Khowang will finally echo that recognition remains the most eagerly awaited answer of this election season.
