GUWAHATI: The Tripura Congress has left the final decision regarding implementation of National Register of Citizens (NRC) on the Supreme Court even as it maintained that “there are complex problems” to be addressed before such a document can be prepared for the border state.
The Opposition party, unlike some of the other parties and groups demanding an “Assam-like” NRC, maintains that the demography in Tripura is different from Assam, and therefore, there are other factors to be considered before looking at the feasibility of such a register.
“Unlike Assam, where it is basically a minority versus majority issue, in Tripura, we have a population of shifting cultivators in the hilly areas, locally called jhumiyas, who are sons of the soil but do not have official documents to claim their citizenship. These sections have contributed and developed the state between 1971 and 2018, and therefore asked to leave the state on the basis of not possessing documents,” Tripura Congress spokesperson Tapas Dey told The Shillong Times on Saturday.
“Besides, there is a Chakma population who has come from Chittagong Hill Tracts apart from other groups in the state. So, the problem is complex when it comes to preparation of NRC in Tripura,” Dey said.
The clamour for a citizens register, especially after Assam published the complete draft NRC on July 30, 2018, has grown shriller in the neighbouring states, even Tripura, where the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT) has even said that it would take recourse to agitation if such a register based on 1971 as the cut-off year, was not put in place.
Regional parties such as the Tripura People’s Front (TPF) have also petitioned the apex court in Delhi regarding implementation of NRC, following which the latter has notified the Centre and the Election Commission. The cut-off year proposals vary though, with the TPF demanding 1949 as the deadline
“We will not commit anything in regard to the merit of such a case and leave it for the Supreme Court to take a call,” Dey said.
The Congress leader however said that illegal settlers have to be identified and deported from where they came from. “Before Independence, Tripura, which was a princely state, had a population of 14lakh while another 16 lakh refugees also settled in the state,” he said.
Taking a dig at the previous dispensation, he said, “We believe that the Left Front government had enrolled several suspected Bangladeshis in the electoral roll which had impacted the fate of the elections then. These suspected illegal settlers should be identified and deported.”
Dey further slammed Tripura chief minister Biplab Kumar Deb for his “change of stance” on NRC. “He had about three months back said that there was no demand for NRC in Tripura. Now he is saying that if the NRC exercise succeeds in Assam, the state might consider exploring the same. But I am sorry to say that he does not understand the demography of Tripura,” he said.