Repatriation of Bru refugee to start from Jan

Agartala: Mizoram government has been preceding to start repatriation of Bru refugees from next month and oversee the preparation Joint Secretary of Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) is scheduled to visit Bru camps in Panisagar of North Tripura next week.
Officials here on Sunday stated that MHA had held third meeting of Joint Monitoring Group (JMG) in Delhi on November 24 last involving Mizoram government and Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Forum (MBDPF) in regard to repatriation process.
Officials however, stated that the identification of displaced Brus in six relief camps to get the factual number of bonafide citizen of Mizoram has been completed and the final figure indicated a convincing growth of the refugees.
“Based on the identification record, Mizoram government undertaken fresh initiative to identify more villages for resettlement of the repatriated families. Earlier, 77 locations in three districts of the state were identified for resettlement of Brus,” officials said.
According to report, Mizoram government has taken steps for speedy issuance of birth certificates to those who were born in relief camps after 1997. As a result, the process of repatriation would take longer time to start than it was decided earlier.
Meanwhile, MBDPF leaders have reiterated their longstanding demand for allotment of five acres of land to each Bru family in Mizoram and a government job to each repatriated family besides, cash assistance of Rs 80,000.
In addition, they want a month financial assistance of Rs 5,000 to each family for two years until Brus stated settle agriculture in their homeland.
However, Mizoram government ruled out of providing five acres of land to each repatriated Bru families.
The MBDPF has also revived their demand for a separate autonomous district council by filing a writ petition in the Supreme Court to this effect.
The writ petition, which called for creation of a separate autonomous district council for the Bru community, is a reversal of the letter written by the forum on May 4, 2016 to the Ministry of Home Affairs, in which it said that it was no longer pressing for autonomy for the community. (UNI)