Govt may go soft on Assam citizenship Bill

Guwahati, July 17

In view of raging protests in the North-East, especially in Assam’s Brahmaputra Valley, the BJP-led government at the Centre is likely to soft-paddle the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016, at least for the time being.

Sources said the Centre did not anticipate that the Bill would generate such high-decibel mass protests in Assam and other N-E states where the governments have expressed strong reservation.

The Bill is being seen as detrimental to protection of rights and identity of indigenous population in the states. It aims at providing citizenship to the persecuted minority communities such as Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians who had to flee their homes in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Because of the strong protests in the region, the government is unlikely to table the Bill in Parliament in the monsoon session even as a party source here said the BJP was contemplating to bring a private member resolution to prompt detailed discussion on the status of those persecuted minorities from neighbouring countries taking refuge in India.

However, the government is unlikely to withdraw the Bill as it will lead to adverse repercussion in some other parts of the country. But at the same time the ruling BJP is not keen to impose it against the wishes of the people of Assam valley. The BJP’s ally in Assam, Asom Gana Parishad, has already made it clear that the day the Bill would be passed in Parliament it would snap ties with the BJPin Assam.

The All Assam Students Union asserted that the agitation would continue till the Bill is withdrawn. — TNS