Scholars voice concern as NIA quizzes IIT professor

The federal agency had called Saikia – a history professor in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences - for questioning on Saturday.

A group of Indian scholars and academics from across the country have voiced their concern over the questioning of IIT Guwahati professor Arupjyoti Saikia, by National Investigation Agency (NIA), allegedly for his involvement in the violent anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests that broke out in the State.

A group of Indian scholars and academics from across the country have voiced their concern over the questioning of IIT Guwahati professor Arupjyoti Saikia, by National Investigation Agency (NIA). (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)

“Professor Saikia is an adornment to the literary and intellectual world of Assam and of India. He is also an individual of high moral character; gentle, soft-spoken, and utterly non-violent. His devotion to his students at IIT Guwahati is exemplary. That a scholar of such standing, and a human being of such decency, has been called for intensive grilling by the National Investigative Agency is deeply distressing. We urge that the NIA treat him with the dignity and respect he deserves, and allow him to continue his professional work unimpeded,” read the statement signed by 42 eminent scholars.

“Professor Saikia is one of the country’s most distinguished and respected historians. The author most recently of a landmark history of the Brahmaputra River, he has also written significant works on forest and agrarian history. For his contributions to scholarship, Professor Saikia is hugely admired, indeed venerated, in his native Assam. He also has a very high reputation nationally and even internationally, with his scholarship recognized by a prestigious fellowship from Yale University,” it further said.

The federal agency had called SAikia – a history professor in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences - for questioning on Saturday. He was summoned in the same case in which KMSS leader Akhil Gogoi has been arrested.

Following widespread anti-CAA protests Assam Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had hinted that a leading academician from the state had orchestrated the violent protests and the “burning of Assam secretariat in Dispur.” Without naming the person Sarma had said there was electronic evidence of a prominent intellectual from a Central Government institution coordinating with the attackers.