From Our Correspondent
Guwahati: All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) has accused the Congress government in Assam led by chief minister Tarun Gogoi of trying to rehabilitate ‘violence-displaced’ illegal Bangladeshi migrants in Bodoland Territorial Autonomous District Council (BTC) areas despite those people failing to show any valid land ownership document or voters’ list having their names.
The AASU has demanded that those violence-displaced people be kept in detention camps till their citizenship status is properly verified.
The AASU has raised the demand in the wake of the apprehension aired by certain quarters in the State that a large number of suspected illegal migrants from Bangladesh took shelter in the refugee camps meant for violence-displaced during July communal riot between Bodo tribe people and Muslims in Bodoland Territorial Autonomous District Council (BTC) areas and parts of Dhubri district in Assam.
A large number of ‘violence-displaced’ Muslim families are still lodged in relief camps as their rehabilitation has run into rough weather for their failure to produce genuine land ownership document or poll rolls having their names.
The administration in the BTC ruled by Bodo political party, Bodoland People’s Front (BPF), has insisted that violence-hit having no valid land ownership document or names in voters’ list would be allowed to be settled in the BTC area.
Chief Minister Gogoi has been advocating acceptance of documents such as bank passbook, ration card, NREGA job card, BTC voters’ list of 2005, Census of 2011, etc., as valid citizenship proofs for those without land ownership documents in BTC areas.
“Under no circumstance should anyone entering Assam after 1971 be settled in BTAD and Dhubri district or in any other place of the State in the name of rehabilitation of people displaced by the recent BTC violence.
Those who do not have land ownership records should be kept in detention camps till their citizenship status is ascertained by the Government,” AASU adviser Dr Samujjal Bhattacharya, president Sankar Prasad Ray and general secretary Tapan Gogoi said.
The AASU leaders said that the chief minister was all along bending over backwards to have post-1971 migrants settled in BTC and Dhubri district under the pretext of rehabilitating the people displaced by violence.
“This is something we will never accept. The Bodos, Koch-Rajbongshis, Gorkhas, Adivasis and the indigenous Muslims staying in relief camps will definitely be rehabilitated but those entering Assam after 1971 must be pushed back,” the AASU said.