Members of the Nasya Sheikh (Rajbanshi Muslims) community in north Bengal have raised a slew of demands for their socio-economic development and the effective functioning of a development board that the state government constituted for them.

On Sunday, around 2,000 of them assembled at a meeting convened by the Nasya Sheikh Unnayan Parishad, an association of the community, at Rabindra Bhavan in Cooch Behar.

Aminal Haque, secretary of the central committee of the Parishad, said in 2021, the state had announced the creation of the Nasya Sheikh Development Board.

“However, the board has not been constituted in a full-fledged manner and is not working effectively for our development, unlike other development boards which the state has formed in north Bengal. The district magistrate of Cooch Behar has been the chairman of the board and none from our community has been put in the post,” he said.

At the meeting, Haque and other speakers also underscored that most of them are migrant workers and belong to weaker economic sections of society.

“There are school dropouts in our community and yet, funds allocated for the development of minorities are not being spent. We want the board to take appropriate initiatives and will wait for a month. If our demands are not met, we will launch protests from August,” added Haque.

Shaukat Ali, the South Dinajpur district secretary of the Parishad, said around 60 lakh Nasya Sheikhs live in north Bengal. “Being minorities, we belong to the OBC category and want the state to announce that women of our community will get monthly assistance of ₹1,200 under the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme like SCs and STs. As of now, they get ₹1,000,” said Ali.

Farid Akhtar Gazi, the Jalpaiguri district secretary of the forum, said the state should announce that they are the “sons of the soil” in north Bengal.