The main question in Assam today is whether the Government and the ULFA are actually interested in talking peace to find a solution? This question is relevant as the unprecedented peace initiative was derailed after merely a six-week-long temporary truce on flimsy grounds. When the ULFA handpicked 11 members and formed the People's Consultative Group (PCG) in September 2005, hopes for peace was high in Assam. Since their formation in 1979 with the avowed objective of achieving a 'sovereign, Socialist Assam' this was probably the best option for peace. When, a year and three rounds of PCG-Centre talks later, New Delhi announced a 15-day unilateral truce on August 13, such hopes were reinforced. The guns and the ULFA bombs fell silent for a while until the Centre revoked the suspension of military operations on September 24. Assam started bleeding again.

The peace process got off the rails for the following reasons:

• The Army publicly expressed doubts (through a press statement issued by the Press Information Bureau's Defence Wing) about the ULFA's intentions to launch an offensive even while the so-called truce was on, suggesting that the Union government was talking in different voices.
• The ULFA sticking to its demand for release of five of its detained leaders saying their presence was needed for any decision on the issue of entering into talks with the Government.
• The ULFA refusing to name its team of negotiators.
• The Union government insisting on a written assurance from the ULFA that it was actually interested in talking peace with New Delhi.

The ULFA refused to give such a written assurance saying if it was not interested in peace talks, it would not have formed the PCG in the first place. To that extent, the ULFA had a point. The Government's demand can not bejustified as it was holding talks with the PCG, which was accepted as a bridge between New Delhi and the ULFA. The PCG clearly acknowledged that its purpose was to prepare the ground for a direct meeting between the Government and the rebel leaders. The Government's apprehension about the fallout of the release of the five detained ULFA leaders was understandable; in 1992, some ULFA leaders had jumped parole and went underground after a failed meeting with then Prime Minister Narasimha Rao.

From the Government's point of view, intelligence agencies, ans security froces including the Army, paramilitary and the police, were rattled by evidence of the ULFA stepping up its extortion drive among the trade and business community, including the tea industry, and appearing to regroup itself. It became serious, when ULFA cadres attacked a police patrol and later killed a tea planter in the third week of September. These incidents hastened New Delhi into calling off the suspension of military operations against the ULFA. The cat-and-mouse game began all over again with the ULFA resuming its grenade and improvised explosive device (IED) attacks, killing and injuring security personnel as well as innocent civilians.

Several questions assume importance: Is the ULFA under pressure from its foreign mentors not to join the peace bandwagon? Is the ULFA really independent enough as an organization to take important decisions on its own? Is there a division within the ULFA over the issue of peace talks? The ULFA has been denying that it was under the influence of any external force, but the security establishment in India is convinced that it is under the control or patronage of the Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence and the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), Bangladesh's intelligence agency.

The tragedy so far is that there is no meaningful contribution from civil society to get things back on track. The PCG is certainly not a civil society body because its members were handpicked by the ULFA. But, it was seen as a catalyst and, therefore, its role was taken seriously by all pro-peace groups and individuals. But, the PCG formally announced its withdrawal from the process of negotiations on the matter with New Delhi, thereby exposing its limitations or inability to deal with the issue from a broader perspective. By withdrawing from the peace talks, the PCG had failed as a peacemaker or as a go-between. But, as things stand today, the PCG's relevance is not yet lost and the group, either on its own, or at the Government's initiative, must make a second attempt to work things out and get the peace process back on rails.