The North East Students’ Organisation (Neso) on Wednesday announced a series of agitations as a protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016.

Neso comprises eight major students’ organisations from the seven states of the Northeast. These include the All Assam Students’ Union, Khasi Students’ Union, Garo Students’ Union, All Arunachal Pradesh Students’ Union, Naga Students’ Federation, All Manipur Students’ Union, Mizo Zirlai Pawl and the Twipra Students’ Federation.

The organisation had earlier met Union home minister Rajnath Singh and his junior Kiren Rijiju in Delhi, expressing their “total opposition” to the bill that seeks to grant Indian citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians who fled religious persecution in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan and entered India before December 31, 2014.

Neso also opposed the bill before the joint parliamentary committee which has been taking opinions from various stakeholders and public.

Neso leaders said they would organise protests here on November 20 and in all capitals of the northeastern states on November 30. They will hold a protest rally in New Delhi at the beginning of Parliament’s session and meet ministers, MLAs and MPs of all the seven states to oppose the bill. “We are pleased that the Meghalaya cabinet has decided to oppose the bill. The Mizoram government has also taken a decision on the same line. We demand that other states reject the bill through similar cabinet decisions,” Neso chairman Samuel Jyrwa said.

The students’ organisation also opposed the Foreigners’ (Amendment) Order, 2015, the Passport (Entry into India) Notification, 2015 and the Centre’s decision to issue long-term visas to people from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

“All these steps have been taken to protest entry of illegal Hindu Bangladeshis who had entered illegally in the Northeast besides other parts of the country till December 31, 2014. These measures are communal in nature and, therefore, unconstitutional,” Jyrwa said.

Neso adviser Samujjal Bhattacharjya said: “The bill is a design of the Centre to derail update of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam.”

“We have been demanding update of the NRC in entire Northeast but with different modalities for each state.”

“All states of the Northeast will oppose the bill together. The Centre should realise that imposing the bill on the region will be a political injustice,” Bhattacharjya said.