GUWAHATI: A Tripura legislator has termed the demand of the Young Mizo Association to “delete the names of all the 700 Bru voters enrolled in the revised voter list” as unconstitutional.
In a statement issued to the media on Saturday, Pramod Reang, the MLA, said that in accordance with the Constitution of India, the voter list has to be revised every year.
“As such, the chief electoral officer of Mizoram (SB Shashank) had revised the same and 700 new Bru voters were enrolled in the final voter list in 2018-19. But the YMA has demanded that the 700 names be deleted from the voters list, which is an unconstitutional demand raised by it ahead of the Assembly elections,” Reang said in the statement.
The MLA said that the YMA had opposed the casting of votes by displaced Bru voters in transit camps in Naisingpara, Ashapara, Hazacherra, Kaskaupara, Khakchangpara, and Hamsapara among others, where the Election Commission consented to set up polling booths.
In this connection, Reang said, the Mizoram NGO had called for the removal of the CEO and organised a mass rally in Aizawl on November 6.
“It is surprising and unconstitutional that YMA demanded that none from the Bru community would be allowed to stand as a candidate in the November 28 Assembly election or else would be responsible for his/her life,” the MLA said.
Reang said that he had visited the Bru populated areas in Mizoram such as Dampa Rengpui, Tuipui Bari, Tuidam and about ten other villages where the community has said that it has faced deprivation, neglect, suppression for long and that they wanted to come out of it.
“I condemn the unconstitutional and anti-democratic thinking of YMA and hope that the government would do something for the Bru people of Mizoram,” the legislator said.