Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) and the All Assam Students Union (AASU) on Wednesday staged peaceful protests across the state with black flags to mark the fifth anniversary of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), vowing to oppose the “anti-Assam” legislation till it was revoked.
The CAA, which was passed by Parliament on December 11, 2019, fast-tracks Indian citizenship for non-Muslims from Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan who have entered the country by 2014. On March 11 this year, the Centre made the act effective by notifying its rules. According to an AJP leader, around 14 persons have secured citizenship under the CAA in Assam till now.
In Guwahati, members of the AJP, which was born out of the anti-CAA movement along with the Raijor Dal, lined up at Chachal in Guwahati on Wednesday with a massive “We Oppose CAA” banner while AASU members staged their protest with black flags and placards that said “No CAA” outside their headquarters Swahid Nyas.
AJP president Lurinjyoti Gogoi, demanding the scrapping of the contentious Act, said they would continue to oppose the Act till it is scrapped because it was not only “unconstitutional” but also a threat to the future of Assam by ensuring citizenship to illegal immigrants and violative of Clause 6 of the 1985 Assam Accord (which provides constitutional and administrative safeguards to the Assamese people).
The CAA issue was one of the poll planks of the Opposition parties in the 2021 Assembly and 2024 Lok Sabha polls which were won by the BJP-led alliance. But Wednesday’s protests against the legislation suggest that it will remain an issue in the state because influx from Bangladesh is a sensitive issue in Brahmaputra Valley, observers said.
“Today is a Black day for Assam. The Centre has betrayed Assam by imposing the CAA on the state by ignoring the sentiments of the people against the legislation, by ignoring the sacrifice of the 860 Assam Movement martyrs. Since we have only 14 MPs, the Centre is not bothered about us, for which they have forcibly imposed CAA on us,” Lurinjyoti Gogoi said.
Gogoi also invoked the October 17 Supreme Court ruling which upheld the constitutional validity of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act granting citizenship to immigrants who came before March 25, 1971.
He further said: “We have already taken the burden of illegal immigrants from 1951 to 1971 on humanitarian grounds. If the Centre wants to accept the illegal immigrants they should settle them in Gujarat (Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state), not in Assam. We are against the CAA irrespective of religion.”
He also took a dig at the BJP-led state government for observing Swahid Diwas on Tuesday as a mark of respect to the martyrs of the Assam Agitation against foreigners from 1979 to 1985.
