Participants in the seminar included the following:
Kanak Sen Deka: President Elect of the Asom Sahitya Sabha, which is one of the most important civil society organisations in Assam. He is also a prolific writer and editor of the Assamese daily ''Dainik Agradoof'.

Hare Krisna Deka: A retired career Indian Police Service officer and former Director General of Police, Assam, Deka is also a front-ranking poet-writer and is the recipient of the prestigious Sahitya Akademi Award.

D.N. Bezboruah: Editor of the Guwahati based newspaper The Sentinel, Bezboruah is a writer-critique of a very high standing.

Dr. Abu Nasar Saeid Ahmed: Director of the Guwahati based think tank, the Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development, and a scholar of repute.

George Chaco: A senior member of the corporate sector, George has been a member of various trade and economic delegations from the NorthEast to the outside world. He is also a keen observer of the realities of Assam and is a former President of the Rotary club in Guwahati.

H.N. Das: A former Chief Secretary of Assam, Das is a well-known economist and columnist of Assam.

Bobbeeta Sarma: A professor of history in Guwahati, Sarma is a celebrated media personality in the region and a front-ranking women issue activist.

All of the speakers and the participating audience called for peace in the state, and condemned the ULFA for carrying out large-scale violence in the name of revolution. Lamenting the state of insurgency in Assam, the Asom Sahitya Sabha President, Kanak Sen Deka said that lack of development has led to the present situation and that there was a felt need for a cultural revolution in Assam. He invoked the participation of the Assamese people in the country's freedom struggle and stated that the country needed leaders such as Gandhi and Bose. He also urged that the feeling of alienation among the people of North East should be redressed. The Editor of The Sentinel, D.N. Bezboruah even stated that the word 'insurgency' should not be applied to the ULFA, as the banned group is nothing but a ''bunch of terrorists". He said that the nomenclature 'insurgency' to the ULFA gave it respectability and credibility. He said "we are giving the ULF A a ticket to dialogue by calling then insurgents." He stated that the word insurgency stands for a "Collective Upward Rising" which is not the case in the case of the ULFA, who not only do not have a support base among the Assamese people, but are also carrying out an anti-India agenda at the behest of agencies that are inimical to the interest of India and Assam, such as the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan. He questioned the government's inaction against the ISI and asked what has been done against the four ISI agents who were arrested in the heart of Guwahati by the Assam Police. He called for coercive diplomacy by New Delhi in order to restrain Dhaka's intransigence about North East Indian terror camps in the erstwhile East Pakistan. Bezboruah also lamented that the economic activity in Assam has come to a standstill because of the violent activities of the ULFA.

Speaking about the economics of insurgency, former chief secretary of Assam, H.N. Das stated that when the ULFA first began their quest with terror they had sought to highlight the economic backwardness of Assam. Indeed. in a small booklet they had strongly put forward the idea that after achieving their so-called independence from India, they would be able to reorganise the entire economy and bring prosperity to Assam, particularly through the tea and oil industries. However, later actions of the ULFA have only been tantamount to extortion from these very two industries and the banned outfit has even begun targeting the infrastructure belonging to the oil sector. Das said that the ULFA has caused considerable damage to Assam's economy through the destruction and mutilation of the state's industrial and economic paraphernalia. The Robin Hood image that they had tried to project during the early years has been lost on the way. The agricultural development through collective farming and by recourse to Marxian methods too has been abandoned. Das concluded by stating that ultimately the ULFA remained only as an organisation for the extortion of money through terrorism.

George Chaco gave a different dimension to the problem by looking at the ULFA's paraphernalia and relations with Pakistan and Bangladesh. He said, "The ULFA is today controlled by the ISI and other fundamentalist Jihad groups." He questioned as to how long will it take for an illegal migrant to become a puppet of the Jihadis for creating havoc in this country? He said, "For a migrant who does not relate to the culture and customs of this State...For a migrant who has his kith and kin in another country For a migrant who has a different language...for a poor migrant who does not have roof over his head who does rot get a square meal in a day.. .How easy it becomes to corrupt his mind for the cause of Jihad? Why don't we look at this migrant from a poor country a more dynamic angle? We need him for his cheap labour resource to build our infrastructure. our homes. He is a very diligent and hardworking man, he can work tirelessly for long hours in most inhuman conditions for very meagre wages, even though he gets short changed most of the time by the contractors and other middlemen. When we need him. "why can't we respect him, give him a work permit, protect his rights as :a foreigner, protect his money, give him a better wage, it can be a win win situation. .. we could have advertisements in the Bangladeshi media that  we want him. He does not have to sneak in, he is given his "work permit at the border points. The local authorities check these work permits; he is not employed without a work permit...similarly employing a person without a work permit is made a crime .. .High-tech fences have not worked in America, Hispanics have almost become 25 per cent of the American Population, it is madness to think that border fencing and river patrolling will work in these regions, specially when one looks at the terrain. Why can't this sense come into our intellect? It can't, because the migrant is needed supremely for vote bank politics. Why don't we face it by understanding that we can in no way push the migrants out by force? The only solution lies in economic means, as this is the basic essence of why the migration takes place. For this the most fundamental requirement is to stop further migration. A few things the Government could think of:

Work permit

Compulsory temporary Photo Identity Card for those who are already in and are of doubtful Citizenship.

Large-scale computerisation with digital identification databases which are on-line.

Economically motivate them to opt for Work Permits instead of temporary Photo Identity Card by giving a better deal to the Official foreigners.

Electronic surveillance on the border, maybe even mining the entire border keeping all safety precautions as well as ensuring that this message is known to all.

Support the economic development of Bangladesh.

Identify all the supporters of Migration and more importantly those who take advantage and promote this phenomenon. Deal with them appropriately.

A few things we could think of as members of a concerned society. Identify the key influencers and decision makers, current and futuristic- start contacts with them- show them real time data and the threat.

Bind people together over the issue.

Create a mass movement to ensure that migrants are not given any gainful employment.

Identify people in Government mainly in Police and Civil administration that provide citizenship document to suspected migrants and have them socially boycotted.

Continue to support the print media who are getting their act together.

And look at ways how migrants can be totally cut of from votebanks...change/amend the Constitution if need be.

Bobbeeta Sarma brought to bear her role as a women rights activist and spoke passionately about the need of the womenfolk of Assam to control the insurgency problem. She also spoke about the cry for peace that was emanating in Assam from every quarter. She referred to a recent meeting of prominent intellectuals, cultural personalities, politicians, NGO leaders, and teachers that was convened by the Chief Minister of Assam to discuss the current scenario in the backdrop of the recent attacks by the ULFA. Speaking about the occasion, Sarma said, "I was present in the meeting and my observation is that the people of Assam are tired of unrest of any kind and want peace at any cost. There was unanimous appeal to the ULFA to start the peace process and come to the negotiating table. Most of the elderly people who were present appealed to the ULFA leaders to ''Return to Assam" and said, ''Ghoror lora ghoroloi ubhati ahibo lage" (the boys should return to their homes). Such is the sentiment of the Assamese people at the moment as far as the ULFA is concerned. I think the ULFA should seize this opportunity and come forward for talks and start the peace process." Invoking  her role as a mother, Sarma said, "As a woman, as a mother all I can say is that women are nurturers and not destroyers. It is not in the nature of women to encourage violence of any kind. Many times I have wondered about the women ULFA cadres, the wives of the leaders, their children. Can we not appeal to the women members to come forward to the mainstream? Can we not offer rehabilitation schemes for them and their children? No mother would want her children to live a life of threat and danger and I am sure they can also play a big role in changing the minds of their husbands and persuade them to shun the path of violence. As a woman I am also concerned for the welfare and future of our children. When little children ask me why the school children in Dhemaji were killed, I am choked with emotion and am not able to give them an appropriate answer. When they ask me why bomb blasts are being carried out . . .can anybody tell me how to answer the queries of 6 year olds or 8 year olds..my heart goes out to them. Is this the kind of atmosphere they should grow up in? Is this the kind of world we should give them? Children should be allowed to bloom like flowers and not be terrorized and made to feel that the world they are going to live is a dangerous place and the saddest part is that we adults are responsible for giving them a world that is fraught with fear and strife."

Earlier speaking in a similar vein, the former Director General of Police, Hare Krisna Deka said that the seminar was very relevant and timely as it came at a time when the ULFA is unleashing a reign of terror. He called for a forceful articulation of the demand for peace and against insurgency and exhorted the people of Assam to raise their voice in a forceful and spontaneous manner against the violence unleashed by the ULFA. Providing a scholarly overview of the ULFA's growth and consolidation, Deka stated that the ULFA appeared in Assam's geopolitical scenario in the early part of the nineteen-eighties, when the state of Assam was already in turmoil over a student-sponsored agitation on the issue of foreigners. But the ULFA's original ideology has been substituted with not only the wanton perpetration of violence, but also the joining of hands with anti-India forces. Deka stated that in recent times, the ULFA has become desperate and has begun targeting innocent people, thereby exposing its violent face. The Dhemaji blast of 5 August 2004 has even disturbed the earlier complacent rural mind in Assam and the public opinion against the ULFA has found expression in the protest marches and rallies that were organised throughout the state. Deka however recommended that there should be a concerted effort to channelise the people's anti-ULFA voice. He also called upon all sections of the Assamese society to raise their voice against the banned organisation in a forceful and spontaneous manner. He however cautioned that the ULFA despite its many setbacks cannot be written off simply as a nuisance or as a criminal outfit. Its violence potential is still adequate to disturb peace in the state of Assam, and therefore the need to combat it on all levels including the psychological level as well. He also stated that the irrelevance of the ULFA could be proved through a strategy of economic development whose benefits reach the masses in real terms.