More than four million people have been excluded from a list of Indian citizens in the northeast state of Assam, according to reports by Benar News, an online news service affiliated with the US-based Radio Free Asia, as well as various Indian newspapers and websites.
The list, known as the National Register of Citizens (NRC), is being updated for the first time since 1951 to include people who have legal identity documents issued before March 24, 1971 and their descendants.
The names of about 29 million of the nearly 33 million applicants in Assam were included in the list. Those excluded consist mainly of people who have migrated to India since the outbreak of the Bangladesh war of independence from Pakistan.
Benar quoted Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of the neighboring state of West Bengal, as saying: “We are worried because people are being made refugees in their own country, it’s a plan to throw out Bengali-speaking people and Biharis from Assam.
“As many as 4 million Bengalis have been declared non-Indians. What will happen if they [Assam authorities] push them back and if Bangladesh does not want to take them back?”
Banerjee’s concern was that all those people may end up in her state. But Rahul Sinha, from India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, was quoted as saying that Banerjee was overreacting and that the Assam government is only “trying to identify illegal immigrants.”
Potentially volatile issue
Migration from Bangladesh to Assam is a potentially volatile issue. In the early 1980s it led to violent attacks by locals on people who were believed to be Bangladeshis.
Those events led to the signing of an accord between the Indian government and leaders of the student-led anti-immigrant movement in Assam – and the formation of the United Liberation Front of Assam by militants who opposed the settlement.
The accord listed a number of measures to be taken to deal with the issue of immigration, but critics argue that migration from Bangladesh has continued unabated.
Critics of the NRC process, on the other hand, argue that it is unfairly targeted at Muslims and other minorities. Arshad Madani, president of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, an Islamic organization, warned in 2016 that “Assam would burn” if the NRC was implemented. But he did not say whether the “fire” would be lit by Muslims excluded from citizenship, or local anti-immigrant activists.
PPFA urges Ms Mamata to honour SC
Guwahati: Expressing annoyances over a State government chief’s disorderly comments against the process of citizens’ scanning under the direction of Supreme Court of India, the Patriotic People’s Front Assam (PPFA) urges everyone to exercise restrain while commenting over the National Register of Citizens (NRC) updation in Assam.
The forum, at the same time, appreciated the people of Assam for their political maturity, they have shown in the time of many divisive forces’ unwanted designs to divide the greater Assamese society in the linguistic and religious lines.
“Denouncing all kinds of speculation, floated by various local, national and international elements about impending disturbance & violence after the publication of final NRC draft, the habitants of Assam have shown utmost sensitivity,” said a statement issued by the PPFA.
But contrary to the restrain and greatness of the greater Assamese society few political party leaders, including West Bengal chief minister Mamata Bannerjee, has tried their best to garner political mileages out of it. The Trinamool Congress chief even did not hesitate to make comments indirectly disobeying the SC for personal gains, it added.
It may be noted that Ms Mamata has influenced a number of opposition political parties to raise voices against the NRC updation in Assam and the Parliament witnessed uproars for many days. She went on speaking that the Bhartiya Janata Party led governments in New Delhi and Dispur were hatching conspiracies against the Bengali (read Muslim) people of Assam. She even predicted colossal disturbances after the NRC draft publication, but later simply changed her version.
Urging Ms Mamata to maintain due honour to the SC, the PPFA argued that she should take the lead in compiling a comprehensive NRC (as many Kolkata based politicians are demanding now) for the whole country with the basis of 1951 and in need she may ask for necessary expertise from Assam, as the State has successfully completed the final draft of NRC under the guidance of the apex court.