Representatives of the Nasya Sheikh community (Rajbanshi Muslims) in north Bengal have decided to write to the President of India, seeking the withdrawal of the Waqf amendment bill that the BJP-led Centre plans to pass in Parliament.

“In January, we will send memorandums to the President through the district magistrates of all the eight districts of north Bengal. We feel this bill will harm the interests of people,” Aminal Haque, secretary of the central committee of Nasya Sheikh Unnayanb Parishad here on Sunday.

He was speaking on the sidelines of the two-day biennial general meeting of the Parishad. The meeting concluded on Sunday.

Haque, who is also the vice-chairman of the Nasya Sheikh Development Board that the state has formed, said they will also write to chief minister Mamata Banerjee, seeking her intervention on certain issues.

“The Trinamool government has constituted many development boards for the socio-economic development of different communities. However, unlike the other boards, the board meant for us does not have a member of our community in the chairman’s post,” he added.

Altogether, around 50 lakh people of the community live in north Bengal. As of now, the district magistrate of Cooch Behar is the ex-officio chairman of the board.

He pointed out that so far, the state has allotted only two crore rupees for the board. “We want the state to increase the allocation for the board so that different development works can be carried out. Most of the people in our community are poor and we should work for their economic development,” added Haque.