Patowary and Hazarika: The Last Two Veterans of Assam's Historic 1985 Election

GUWAHATI: Among the hundreds of candidates contesting the 2026 Assam assembly elections, two stand apart from the rest — not just for their age or experience, but for a shared chapter of history that stretches back four decades.

BJP's Chandra Mohan Patowary and AGP's Prodip Hazarika are the only two candidates in this election who also contested and won in the 1985 Assam Assembly election — the first polls held after the six-year-long Assam Movement that reshaped the state's political landscape.

Both men have remained in active politics ever since. On April 9, voters will decide whether that journey continues.

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The 1985 election was unlike any other in Assam's political history. It followed the signing of the Assam Accord and the conclusion of the Assam Movement — a mass agitation that had paralysed the state for six years over the issue of illegal immigration.

The newly formed Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), born out of that movement, swept to power. The election marked a generational shift in Assam politics, and both Patowary and Hazarika were among those who rode that wave to their first legislative victories.

Patowary won his first assembly seat in 1985 from the then Dharmapur LAC, contesting as an independent. Though a member of the newly formed AGP at the time, he and others ran as independents because the party had not yet been registered with the Election Commission of India.

He polled 46,843 votes in that election, defeating Congress rival Bhumidhar Barman. It was the beginning of a remarkable run — Patowary has since won six assembly elections from Dharmapur LAC.

Today, he serves as a cabinet minister in Chief Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma's government. With the Dharmapur constituency eliminated following delimitation, the BJP has fielded him this time from the Tihu LAC in Nalbari district.

Four candidates are contesting from Tihu, with the principal contest expected to be between Patowary and Congress candidate Ratul Patowary. The constituency has 264 polling stations and an electorate of 2,04,770 voters.

Prodip Hazarika's political journey began in the same election, winning from the erstwhile Amguri LAC with 32,509 votes, defeating Congress candidate Kirti Dutta.

He has gone on to win five times as an MLA and currently holds a seat in the Assam Legislative Assembly. Like Patowary, delimitation has uprooted him from his home constituency — Amguri was merged into other seats after the boundary revision — and the AGP has now fielded him from the Sibsagar LAC.

Sibsagar, as reported earlier, is shaping up as one of the election's most competitive three-way contests. The constituency has 278 polling stations and an electorate of 2,10,484 voters.

Both veterans have outlasted political movements, party shifts, constituency changes, and decades of electoral competition. Whether either or both secure another term will be known when votes are counted after polling on April 9.

For now, they remain a living link to one of the most consequential chapters in Assam's democratic history.