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Non-Assamese does not necessarily mean non-Indian. But the two NRC lists published so far classify people in Assam as ‘original inhabitants’ and ‘non-original inhabitants’
The Supreme Court chose Shri Prateek Hazela as the NRC Co-ordinator to implement the directives of the apex court through appropriate officers and well-trained workers. With the publication of the first draft of the NRC, it however became clear that the entire process was for excluding as many linguistic minorities as possible. And the process left much to be desired.
Established historical and anthropological details were blatantly ignored by the NRC coordinator, for example. Bengali-speaking people in Assam became the prime target through a predetermined and over-centralised process in which constitutionally guaranteed rights were taken away and basic human rights and democratic norms were trampled.
The most objectionable aspects of the process are as follows:
A special provision under Sec 4(A) in the citizenship rules, 2003 as amended in 2009, stated that nothing in Rule 4 of the aforesaid rule be applicable in Assam.
This opens up a path of exceptionalism at least on three counts. First, every resident of Assam is asked to apply for inclusion in the NRC furnishing parental linkage to prove that parents of applicant came to Assam within 24th March 1971.
This is termed as legacy data according to which any Indian citizen (who is a citizen elsewhere in India) cannot be an ‘Indian’ citizen in Assam unless he/she furnishes legacy before 1971.
Secondly, this creates a direct anomaly with the very principle of citizenship in Indian constitution i.e. citizenship by birth.
Thirdly the whole exercise is carried out on a retrospective basis for determining legacy until 1971. In no civilised country rules are implemented retrospectively and therefore what is happening in Assam in the name of NRC is outrageous.
The officers entrusted with making decisions about inclusion or exclusion at different centres are known as LRCR who have been deputed by various offices of the state govt. and there is little surprise over reports that a large number of such officials were invariably hostile and worked pro-actively against the Bengali-speaking applicants.
Our Constitution does not allow any discrimination on the basis of race, language and religion. But the NRC coordinator in Assam arranged citizens under two categories, one of original inhabitants (O.I) and the other of non-original inhabitants(NOI) which is arguably unconstitutional. And yet, the initial draft NRC published on 31st December 2017 and the final draft published on 30th July 2018 were arranged in those unconstitutional categories.
No document was sought from people belonging to the so-called ‘OI’ category. Instead, on the basis of their language, food habit, dress code and place of residence their names were included in the NRC.
On the other hand, the non-Assamese inhabitants of the state were subjected to ruthless harassment by different sections of the police and NRC officials while even as they ran from pillar to post to collect and submit various documents as per the first directive.
Even more shockingly, the NRC coordinator arbitrarily sought to withdraw the validity of the basic 1951 NRC, pre-1971 electoral rolls and refugee registration certificate etc., thereby turning the process of NRC into a complete farce.
If there is no validity of the 1951 NRC, what is the coordinator updating? The process of updating the 1951 NRC in that case makes no sense at all.
It is worth recalling that while the NRC process was nearing completion, the NRC coordinator issued two notifications on 1st and 2nd May 2018 to cancel the validity of birth certificates and also declared whimsically that the entire family would be delisted as citizens if even one member is identified as ‘D’ voter (doubtful voter).
The concept of ‘D’ voter was invented in 1997 and this practice is being followed wantonly to subjugate Bengali-speaking people. Even as the NRC process was on, various agencies like the Border police force were let loose to terrorise the hapless Bengalis and pick up arbitrarily defenceless people and packed off to various detention camps.
Thousands of Bengali-speaking people are arbitrarily confined to detention camps, and even the sick are chained like beasts on hospital beds. What is more, at the initial stage itself, the Right to Information Act was snatched away from the people.
The partisan state govt has deployed huge paramilitary forces in areas inhabited by linguistic minorities in order to terrorise them though people have remained peaceful and seem resigned to their lot. As many as 32 suicides have been reported and there are many more cases of people having nervous breakdowns, depression, panic attacks and other psychiatric ailments etc.
The print and electronic media, however, have continued with their poisonous hate campaign against Bengali-speaking minorities.
We are confronting an unprecedented situation due to the exclusion of more than four million people belonging to different non-Assamese communities. Of them, the Bengali Hindus are reported to form the highest in number, closely followed by Bengali-speaking Muslims.
For years together there was a vociferous disinformation campaign which claimed that the demographic balance in Assam had been disturbed by incessant influx of Bangladeshi Muslims, which is not borne out by Census figures.
Indeed, this was a blatant exaggeration. In fact, the disinformation campaign has managed to cloud the judgement of the national press, national political parties, the communally tilted bureaucracy and even common people.
The recently published report of the 2011 Census however clearly shows that there are more than 150 lakh Assamese and 90 lakh Bengali inhabitants in Assam.
But the false propaganda has prejudiced the attitude of the policy makers. Even the judiciary has allowed setting up ‘Foreigners Tribunals’ at different places of Assam, where justice is being denied rather brazenly to the marginalised Bengalis.
For the last several months, the NRC coordinator has issued a series of advertisements to reassure people that the NRC would be correct, just, truthful and unprejudiced as this was being supervised directly by the honourable Supreme Court.
But the two drafts published by the NRC coordinator have neither been correct nor just; rather these lists have turned out to be full of serious errors. More importantly, it has never been directly supervised by the Supreme Court which approved some guidelines, but no judicial officer deputed by the Supreme Court has ever visited any NRC Seva Kendra to inspect and supervise the process.
The officers entrusted with making decisions about inclusion or exclusion at different centres are known as LRCR who have been deputed by various offices of the state govt. and there is little surprise over reports that a large number of such officials were invariably hostile and worked pro-actively against the Bengali-speaking applicants.
The concept of ‘original inhabitants’ is unconstitutional and even historically incorrect. While Tai-Ahoms migrated from Thailand to Assam in 1228 A.D., the predecessors of the Bengali community migrated around 5th or 6th century A.D. to the region around the Kamakhya Temple in Brahmaputra valley and the temples of Shiva at Bhuban Hills and that of Kapila at Badarpur in Barak Valley.
These historical facts have been enumerated by celebrated Assamese historian, HedambaKantaBarpujari in his book History of Assam. There are several other archaeological and historiographical evidences regarding continuous migration of Bengali Hindus in ancient and medieval period as well as that of Bengali Muslims in late medieval and modern periods.
Therefore, more than the Assamese population, the Bengalis and several other tribal people have a better claim to be the original inhabitants.
All descendents of people living in Undivided India are rightful claimants of citizenship in truncated India which contains Assam as well.
The controversial visit of the Joint Parliamentary Committee to Assam in connection with the so-called Citizenship Amendment Bill 2016 has added to the confusion.
It seems to us to be a cleverly planned stratagem of the ruling classes to instigate disharmony, hatred and intolerance among various sections of the society. Moreover, the way it has been drafted itself is tricky because essentially it does not-allow any Bengali Hindu to be qualified for having citizenship. It only talks about granting asylum for a particular period of time to be qualified for being an applicant for citizenship. Thus, it has nothing to do with the NRC as such but lots of animosity have been generated to vitiate the social harmony in Assam.
The proposed amendment is essentially unconstitutional and hence it might not be able to pass the first tests of legal scrutiny.
Hegemonists have viciously injected the idea across the country that all Bengali-speaking citizens are potential Bangladeshis, signifying thereby that even a friendly country like Bangladesh is actually an enemy of India.
At present national media as well as international public opinion clearly indicate that the malicious intention behind the process of NRC is being closely examined. Instances of massive human right violations have drawn the attention of even the UN.
But in Assam they are not satisfied with declaring 40 lakh men and women stateless. They want more at any cost.
The NRC coordinator has proposed to the Supreme Court that the most important documents for claiming citizenship be disallowed. It seems that he has completely surrendered to the de-facto rulers of Assam in order to deprive a large section of the Bengali-speaking community of their legitimate citizenship.
Besides the concept of SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) is aimed at excluding the non-Assamese from citizenship. In the name of raising objection to the hitherto included names of the citizens, the constitutional provision is being blatantly ignored.
Section-17 of the Citizenship Act, 1955 indicates that false complainants are punishable by law. But un-ceremoniously this provision is being rendered ineffective. Now that the Supreme Court has restored the validity of fifteen list ‘A’ documents, the NRC coordinator is concentrating his attack elsewhere.
Establishment of detention camps for Bengalis should have become an international scandal. But, in spite of a well-known election-promise at a public gathering in Silchar by Narendra Modi himself, the largest detention camp is being constructed in Assam with generous government funds. Besides, the state minister of the Home department at the Centre declared that NRC discards would be confined to their residential areas, reminding us of the ghettos created by Hilter for Jews during the Second World War.
It was also publicly declared that their fundamental rights would be forfeited. No wonder then that the NRC is fast degenerating into a nightmare created by insensitive tyrants masquerading as rulers.
The virus of hatred against the Bengalis has already affected several other states in the country and, as a result, even after 72 years of partition, an enigmatic question comes to the fore: Are Bengalis persona-non-grata in India? Could anybody ever imagine that the worst possible intolerance would be propagated by none other than the President of the ruling party who called Bengalis as ‘termites’?
In fact, every other day some intolerant voice of the ruling class rudely threatens to push Bengalis back to Bangladesh though with that country India does not have any extradition treaty.
Moreover, the authorities of Bangladesh have time and again clarified that there has been no infiltration from Bangladesh.
Of late, the ruling class has thrown all democratic norms to the wind and conspiracies against the Bengali community have entered the ugliest phase. Because even as they are threatening to truncate present West Bengal further, NRC might be imposed throughout the country to create millions of stateless Bengalis.
The darkest hour in the annals of civilization has already deepened in Assam. On 1st November, five ‘termite’ Bengalis belonging to the lowest strata of the society, were butchered by unidentified assassins. As usual there would be formal investigation and yield no outcome whatsoever.
Since the partition of India, Assam has time and again offered a free playground for the organised genocide mostly against the Bengali Muslims. In the last seven decades, none of the criminals has been apprehended. As a result, it appears that the linguistic minorities are condemned to an impending holocaust.
Bengalis in Assam registered their protest throughout Assam on 3rd & 4th November, against the heinous crime perpetuated on 1st November in Dhola in Tinsukia district. Responsibility has to be fixed for the crime against humanity.
Nobody seems to remember the anguished utterances of the Father of the Nation: “If Assam is for the Assamese and Bihar is for the Biharis- India is for whom?” For several generations this basic question has remained unanswered.
Following Partition of the country in 1947, inhabitants of Bengal and Punjab were taken for a ride. The victims of partition in Punjab could find some settlement while the partition-victims of Bengal remained the bone of contention for the rulers of truncated India. That is why even after 72 years of the great national disaster, the Bengalis are summarily dismissed as termites.
The ghosts of the two- nation theory are being openly invoked by communal forces. An affirmative response of the Government of India should be demanded here and now for unambiguous restoration of all human and democratic rights to the scions of Bengali-speaking immigrants irrespective of their religious affiliation.
New union territories need to be created where Bengali and other linguistic minorities may live peacefully with firm commitment to the policy of harmonious coexistence. In this context, multi-lingualism should be practised as a moral code in Assam and all other states with guaranteed constitutional safeguards.
https://www.nationalheraldindia.com...e-and-bihar-for-biharis-then-indiais-for-whom
The Supreme Court chose Shri Prateek Hazela as the NRC Co-ordinator to implement the directives of the apex court through appropriate officers and well-trained workers. With the publication of the first draft of the NRC, it however became clear that the entire process was for excluding as many linguistic minorities as possible. And the process left much to be desired.
Established historical and anthropological details were blatantly ignored by the NRC coordinator, for example. Bengali-speaking people in Assam became the prime target through a predetermined and over-centralised process in which constitutionally guaranteed rights were taken away and basic human rights and democratic norms were trampled.
The most objectionable aspects of the process are as follows:
A special provision under Sec 4(A) in the citizenship rules, 2003 as amended in 2009, stated that nothing in Rule 4 of the aforesaid rule be applicable in Assam.
This opens up a path of exceptionalism at least on three counts. First, every resident of Assam is asked to apply for inclusion in the NRC furnishing parental linkage to prove that parents of applicant came to Assam within 24th March 1971.
This is termed as legacy data according to which any Indian citizen (who is a citizen elsewhere in India) cannot be an ‘Indian’ citizen in Assam unless he/she furnishes legacy before 1971.
Secondly, this creates a direct anomaly with the very principle of citizenship in Indian constitution i.e. citizenship by birth.
Thirdly the whole exercise is carried out on a retrospective basis for determining legacy until 1971. In no civilised country rules are implemented retrospectively and therefore what is happening in Assam in the name of NRC is outrageous.
The officers entrusted with making decisions about inclusion or exclusion at different centres are known as LRCR who have been deputed by various offices of the state govt. and there is little surprise over reports that a large number of such officials were invariably hostile and worked pro-actively against the Bengali-speaking applicants.
Our Constitution does not allow any discrimination on the basis of race, language and religion. But the NRC coordinator in Assam arranged citizens under two categories, one of original inhabitants (O.I) and the other of non-original inhabitants(NOI) which is arguably unconstitutional. And yet, the initial draft NRC published on 31st December 2017 and the final draft published on 30th July 2018 were arranged in those unconstitutional categories.
No document was sought from people belonging to the so-called ‘OI’ category. Instead, on the basis of their language, food habit, dress code and place of residence their names were included in the NRC.
On the other hand, the non-Assamese inhabitants of the state were subjected to ruthless harassment by different sections of the police and NRC officials while even as they ran from pillar to post to collect and submit various documents as per the first directive.
Even more shockingly, the NRC coordinator arbitrarily sought to withdraw the validity of the basic 1951 NRC, pre-1971 electoral rolls and refugee registration certificate etc., thereby turning the process of NRC into a complete farce.
If there is no validity of the 1951 NRC, what is the coordinator updating? The process of updating the 1951 NRC in that case makes no sense at all.
It is worth recalling that while the NRC process was nearing completion, the NRC coordinator issued two notifications on 1st and 2nd May 2018 to cancel the validity of birth certificates and also declared whimsically that the entire family would be delisted as citizens if even one member is identified as ‘D’ voter (doubtful voter).
The concept of ‘D’ voter was invented in 1997 and this practice is being followed wantonly to subjugate Bengali-speaking people. Even as the NRC process was on, various agencies like the Border police force were let loose to terrorise the hapless Bengalis and pick up arbitrarily defenceless people and packed off to various detention camps.
Thousands of Bengali-speaking people are arbitrarily confined to detention camps, and even the sick are chained like beasts on hospital beds. What is more, at the initial stage itself, the Right to Information Act was snatched away from the people.
The partisan state govt has deployed huge paramilitary forces in areas inhabited by linguistic minorities in order to terrorise them though people have remained peaceful and seem resigned to their lot. As many as 32 suicides have been reported and there are many more cases of people having nervous breakdowns, depression, panic attacks and other psychiatric ailments etc.
The print and electronic media, however, have continued with their poisonous hate campaign against Bengali-speaking minorities.
We are confronting an unprecedented situation due to the exclusion of more than four million people belonging to different non-Assamese communities. Of them, the Bengali Hindus are reported to form the highest in number, closely followed by Bengali-speaking Muslims.
For years together there was a vociferous disinformation campaign which claimed that the demographic balance in Assam had been disturbed by incessant influx of Bangladeshi Muslims, which is not borne out by Census figures.
Indeed, this was a blatant exaggeration. In fact, the disinformation campaign has managed to cloud the judgement of the national press, national political parties, the communally tilted bureaucracy and even common people.
The recently published report of the 2011 Census however clearly shows that there are more than 150 lakh Assamese and 90 lakh Bengali inhabitants in Assam.
But the false propaganda has prejudiced the attitude of the policy makers. Even the judiciary has allowed setting up ‘Foreigners Tribunals’ at different places of Assam, where justice is being denied rather brazenly to the marginalised Bengalis.
For the last several months, the NRC coordinator has issued a series of advertisements to reassure people that the NRC would be correct, just, truthful and unprejudiced as this was being supervised directly by the honourable Supreme Court.
But the two drafts published by the NRC coordinator have neither been correct nor just; rather these lists have turned out to be full of serious errors. More importantly, it has never been directly supervised by the Supreme Court which approved some guidelines, but no judicial officer deputed by the Supreme Court has ever visited any NRC Seva Kendra to inspect and supervise the process.
The officers entrusted with making decisions about inclusion or exclusion at different centres are known as LRCR who have been deputed by various offices of the state govt. and there is little surprise over reports that a large number of such officials were invariably hostile and worked pro-actively against the Bengali-speaking applicants.
The concept of ‘original inhabitants’ is unconstitutional and even historically incorrect. While Tai-Ahoms migrated from Thailand to Assam in 1228 A.D., the predecessors of the Bengali community migrated around 5th or 6th century A.D. to the region around the Kamakhya Temple in Brahmaputra valley and the temples of Shiva at Bhuban Hills and that of Kapila at Badarpur in Barak Valley.
These historical facts have been enumerated by celebrated Assamese historian, HedambaKantaBarpujari in his book History of Assam. There are several other archaeological and historiographical evidences regarding continuous migration of Bengali Hindus in ancient and medieval period as well as that of Bengali Muslims in late medieval and modern periods.
Therefore, more than the Assamese population, the Bengalis and several other tribal people have a better claim to be the original inhabitants.
All descendents of people living in Undivided India are rightful claimants of citizenship in truncated India which contains Assam as well.
The controversial visit of the Joint Parliamentary Committee to Assam in connection with the so-called Citizenship Amendment Bill 2016 has added to the confusion.
It seems to us to be a cleverly planned stratagem of the ruling classes to instigate disharmony, hatred and intolerance among various sections of the society. Moreover, the way it has been drafted itself is tricky because essentially it does not-allow any Bengali Hindu to be qualified for having citizenship. It only talks about granting asylum for a particular period of time to be qualified for being an applicant for citizenship. Thus, it has nothing to do with the NRC as such but lots of animosity have been generated to vitiate the social harmony in Assam.
The proposed amendment is essentially unconstitutional and hence it might not be able to pass the first tests of legal scrutiny.
Hegemonists have viciously injected the idea across the country that all Bengali-speaking citizens are potential Bangladeshis, signifying thereby that even a friendly country like Bangladesh is actually an enemy of India.
At present national media as well as international public opinion clearly indicate that the malicious intention behind the process of NRC is being closely examined. Instances of massive human right violations have drawn the attention of even the UN.
But in Assam they are not satisfied with declaring 40 lakh men and women stateless. They want more at any cost.
The NRC coordinator has proposed to the Supreme Court that the most important documents for claiming citizenship be disallowed. It seems that he has completely surrendered to the de-facto rulers of Assam in order to deprive a large section of the Bengali-speaking community of their legitimate citizenship.
Besides the concept of SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) is aimed at excluding the non-Assamese from citizenship. In the name of raising objection to the hitherto included names of the citizens, the constitutional provision is being blatantly ignored.
Section-17 of the Citizenship Act, 1955 indicates that false complainants are punishable by law. But un-ceremoniously this provision is being rendered ineffective. Now that the Supreme Court has restored the validity of fifteen list ‘A’ documents, the NRC coordinator is concentrating his attack elsewhere.
Establishment of detention camps for Bengalis should have become an international scandal. But, in spite of a well-known election-promise at a public gathering in Silchar by Narendra Modi himself, the largest detention camp is being constructed in Assam with generous government funds. Besides, the state minister of the Home department at the Centre declared that NRC discards would be confined to their residential areas, reminding us of the ghettos created by Hilter for Jews during the Second World War.
It was also publicly declared that their fundamental rights would be forfeited. No wonder then that the NRC is fast degenerating into a nightmare created by insensitive tyrants masquerading as rulers.
The virus of hatred against the Bengalis has already affected several other states in the country and, as a result, even after 72 years of partition, an enigmatic question comes to the fore: Are Bengalis persona-non-grata in India? Could anybody ever imagine that the worst possible intolerance would be propagated by none other than the President of the ruling party who called Bengalis as ‘termites’?
In fact, every other day some intolerant voice of the ruling class rudely threatens to push Bengalis back to Bangladesh though with that country India does not have any extradition treaty.
Moreover, the authorities of Bangladesh have time and again clarified that there has been no infiltration from Bangladesh.
Of late, the ruling class has thrown all democratic norms to the wind and conspiracies against the Bengali community have entered the ugliest phase. Because even as they are threatening to truncate present West Bengal further, NRC might be imposed throughout the country to create millions of stateless Bengalis.
The darkest hour in the annals of civilization has already deepened in Assam. On 1st November, five ‘termite’ Bengalis belonging to the lowest strata of the society, were butchered by unidentified assassins. As usual there would be formal investigation and yield no outcome whatsoever.
Since the partition of India, Assam has time and again offered a free playground for the organised genocide mostly against the Bengali Muslims. In the last seven decades, none of the criminals has been apprehended. As a result, it appears that the linguistic minorities are condemned to an impending holocaust.
Bengalis in Assam registered their protest throughout Assam on 3rd & 4th November, against the heinous crime perpetuated on 1st November in Dhola in Tinsukia district. Responsibility has to be fixed for the crime against humanity.
Nobody seems to remember the anguished utterances of the Father of the Nation: “If Assam is for the Assamese and Bihar is for the Biharis- India is for whom?” For several generations this basic question has remained unanswered.
Following Partition of the country in 1947, inhabitants of Bengal and Punjab were taken for a ride. The victims of partition in Punjab could find some settlement while the partition-victims of Bengal remained the bone of contention for the rulers of truncated India. That is why even after 72 years of the great national disaster, the Bengalis are summarily dismissed as termites.
The ghosts of the two- nation theory are being openly invoked by communal forces. An affirmative response of the Government of India should be demanded here and now for unambiguous restoration of all human and democratic rights to the scions of Bengali-speaking immigrants irrespective of their religious affiliation.
New union territories need to be created where Bengali and other linguistic minorities may live peacefully with firm commitment to the policy of harmonious coexistence. In this context, multi-lingualism should be practised as a moral code in Assam and all other states with guaranteed constitutional safeguards.
https://www.nationalheraldindia.com...e-and-bihar-for-biharis-then-indiais-for-whom
