Massive exercise in India’s Assam to identify illegal migrants raises tensions

The massive exercise to update the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in the eastern Indian state of Assam has led to controversy as names of millions of people are missing from the final draft of NRC released on 30 July. Critics have alleged that there are flaws in the entire exercise and the names of Indian citizens are also missing.

The NRC is the list of Indian citizens of the Assam state in India. It was prepared in 1951, following the census of 1951. It is being updated to allegedly weed out migrants from Bangladesh and neighboring regions.

Critics, however, see the exercise as an attempt to target Assam's Muslim population on the pretext of identifying illegal immigrants and to create rift between Hindus and Muslims ahead of the next year’s general elections in the country.

National General Secretary of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Ram Madhav said that the NRC is not a political issue. He said employment, education and other basic facilities are denied to the people of Assam on account of the presence of a large number of migrants from Bangladesh.

The Hindu nationalist BJP has linked NRC to national security so that it may not face the allegation of attempting communal polarization through NRC.

For a person’s name to be included in the updated NRC list of 2018, his/ her name or his/her ancestor’s name must be in the 1951 NRC or in any voter list up to 24 March 1971 midnight. This cut-off was agreed upon in the Assam Accord piloted by the then-Rajiv Gandhi government, since the Bangladesh liberation war began on 25 March 1971.

Hundreds of thousands of people from Bangladesh fled to the Indian states of Assam and West Bengal to escape murder, rape and other atrocities following the launch of a liberation movement there. Even after the war was over, Muslim families continued to arrive from Bangladesh to escape poverty.

Assam witnessed a massive agitation demanding identification and deportation of illegal migrants. The agitation popularly known as the Assam Movement began in 1979 and was spearheaded by two organizations: All Assam Students Union (AASU) and All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad (AAGSP). The agitation ended in 1985 with the signing of an accord between the government of India and the leaders of the Assam Movement. The leaders of the Assam Movement subsequently formed a political party, Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), which came to power in the state in 1985 and 1996.

The accord agreed to identify illegal immigrants, who had entered Assam after Bangladesh’s creation in 1971. According to the accord, all foreigners who had entered Assam between 1951 and 1961 were to be given full citizenship, including the right to vote; those who had entered after 1971 were to be deported; the entrants between 1961 and 1971 were to be denied voting rights for ten years but would enjoy all other rights of citizenship.

Although the accord ended the deadlock, the key clauses of the agreement have not been implemented. Deporting illegal Bangladeshi immigrants has always been a part of the BJP's agenda, and in the run up to the 2014 General Elections, BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi (now the country’s prime minister) had said that Bangladeshi immigrants would be deported if his party came to power. However, Modi drew a distinction between Hindu and Muslim migrants from Bangladesh when he said that Hindu migrants from Bangladesh must be accommodated.

Modi had said, “India is the only place for Hindus who are persecuted and suffer in other countries. They will be accommodated here. Our government cannot continue to harass them.”

The then-national president of BJP Rajnath Singh (now home minister) had said that if he was voted to power, the BJP would probe how so many people of a particular community entered the country and settled down. By particular community he meant Muslims.

Currently the BJP Government is in power in Assam. Assam’s Finance Minister Biswa Sarma, who is in charge of citizenship register, has averred that all those whose names do not figure in the final NRC will be deported.

However the mass deportation is not going to be an easy task as the receiving country (Bangladesh) is unlikely to accept that the deportees are its citizens since Bangladesh has time and again denied migrations. Besides Prime Minister Modi enjoys friendly relations with his Bangladeshi counterpart Sheikh Hasina Wajid and deportation will sour the relation between the two countries.

Over 4 million people have been excluded from the final draft of National Register of Citizens released on July 30 in a state that has a population of nearly 34 million. This has led to a war of words between the ruling BJP and the opposition parties.

Rahul Gandhi, president of the India’s main opposition party Congress, has criticized the BJP governments at the center and in Assam over the tardy execution of the exercise of drafting the NRC. He said that reports were pouring in from all corners of Assam that the names of Indian citizens were missing from the final NRC draft. This has created massive insecurity among the people, and those whose names are missing are extremely worried. The government must swiftly resolve the crisis, he said.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has said that the NRC would affect

everyone across the country. This was not a right decision, she said while alleging that people belonging to the state of West Bengal staying in Assam had also being targeted. (The All India Trinamool Congress is currently in power in West Bengal. The party is led by its founder and current Chief Minister of West Bengal Mamata Banerjee. Following the 2014 general elections, it is currently the fourth largest party in the Indian Parliament with 34 seats.)

Home Minister Rajnath Singh clarified that the final draft of the NRC is not the final NRC. People whose names are missing would be given a chance to submit claims and documents. He said that the final NRC would be out in December 2018. No discrimination would be done against anyone, he added.

NRC Assam coordinator Prateek Hajela said that some mistakes in the entire process are possible but that they would be rectified. The officials said that no punitive action will be taken against those left out of the final draft and that they will not be branded as foreigners.

Those whose names are missing include the family of the late former President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed.

BJP National President Amit Shah recently said in West Bengal that the NRC is a process to identify infiltrators and Bangladeshi nationals staying illegally in Assam.

Shah criticized West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for opposing the NRC. He asked Mamata to clarify why she was caring for illegal Bangladeshi migrants. He said she and Congress President Rahul Gandhi are opposing the NRC because the Bangladeshi infiltrators are their vote bank.

He said the BJP Government was firm about implementing the NRC plan and driving out all infiltrators. Shah said the government could bring the NRC to West Bengal as well if it comes to power in that state.

Shah said there are no jobs for the people of Bengal and that the state is underdeveloped. The BJP chief said the NRC was the only solution to the problem. He said the Bangladeshi migrants were a threat to India’s security and should be dragged out of the country. The process of NRC would not be stalled and would continue till all foreign nationals are detected and driven out of Assam, he added.

Meanwhile West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh has also said that if the BJP is voted into power in Bengal in next year’s elections, then the party would push for the National Register of Citizens in Bengal on the same lines as in Assam. He said the BJP would not tolerate any illegal immigrants in Bengal and send them back to Bangladesh.

Ghosh said illegal migrants had made life hell for the people of Bengal and therefore all these unwanted elements must be thrown out. The BJP leader said that once the illegal immigrants are identified they will cancel their voting rights and ensure that they don’t get government subsidies. The illegal immigrants are coming now and we must make sure the next wave of illegal immigrants does not come, Ghosh said, adding that the migrants indulge in illegal activities including terrorism and the minting of fake currency.

Meanwhile Bharatiya Janata Party National Vice President Om Prakash Mathur recently said that his party would implement the National Register of Citizens throughout the country after the national elections next year if it is again voted into power.

The BJP leader said that Indian citizens all over the country are suffering due to the problem of infiltration. He said that Bangladeshi infiltrators are there in each and every village and city of India.