The Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2016 has taken Assam back to the days of the Assam agitation of the 80’s, when a massive movement was built demanding the expulsion of ‘foreigners’ who had entered the state, and were allegedly changing its demography. The agitations and the subsequent movements that eventually led to the enactment of the Illegal Migrants Detection Act (IMDT) of 1983(which was subsequently struck down by the Supreme Court in 2005) as well as the updating of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), ended up pitting the ‘indigenous’ Assamese and other tribal communities against the ‘migrant’ Bengalis – both Hindus and Muslims.
However, the Citizenship Amendment Bill, which proposes citizenship for those non-Muslims who have migrated to India after facing religious persecution in the neighboring countries of Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afganistan, has changed that dynamic, at least for now. Right now, the ‘indigenous’ Assamese and other tribes, as well as the ‘migrant’ Muslim communities, are holding hands together to protest the passage of the bill alleging that its passage would trigger a fresh wave of migration of Bengali Hindus to the state from neighboring Bangladesh.
Ironically enough, there is not enough data to either support or oppose this apprehension. As per the census data of 2011, Assam has over 90 lakh Bengali speakers against 1.5 crore Assamese speakers. The number has increased from about 1.3 crore Assamese and 73 lakh Bengalis in the 2001 census. The successive census reports have not specified exactly how many among these Bengalis are Hindus and how many are Muslims, which makes it very difficult to conduct an unbiased study about the exact demographic pattern of this alleged illegal migration.
However, the current furor has put the Bengali Hindu community of Assam in an extremely precarious condition. The brutal killings of five Bengali Hindus in Assam’s Tinsukia district, back in November shows how vulnerable the community has become after the current turn of events. A video of a few Bengalis being forced to say ‘Bangladeshi, go back’ after being brought down from a bus in Dibrugarh, has also gone viral. In another viral video, a leader of a body called the ‘Lachit Sena’ has threatened the community of ‘dire’ consequences.
There are a number of reasons for the current plight of the Hindu-Bengali community in the northeastern state. A sustained campaign orchestrated by some vested interests has successfully implanted a thought in a large section of the majority of Assamese population that all Bengali speaking people – both Hindus and Muslims are illegal entrants to the state. This theory completely undermines the fact that Assam also consists of the Barak Valley region which is entirely Bengali dominated with a population of close to 40 lakhs. The three districts of Barak Valley – Cachar, Karimganj, and Hailakandi comprise about 25 percent of the geographical area of Assam and its nerve center Silchar is Assam’s second largest urban center after Guwahati.
Many people in these districts are indigenous to the region or have migrated from the neighboring Sylhet district of Bangladesh, which was also a part of Assam prior to the independence. In fact, the current Karimganj district was one of the subdivisions of the Sylhet district before independence. Therefore, the residents of this region – either Hindu or Muslim have every right to migrate to other parts of the state to purchase property or seek employment. Another matter of irony is that the Bengali Hindus of Assam never ever demanded any legislation on the lines of the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2016. They have always agreed on the moot point that Assam should not bear the burden of illegal immigrants and its demographic patterns should not be altered.
However, the entire Bengali community has faced unprecedented persecution in the name of foreigner detection in recent years. Many people were branded foreigners and put behind bars and had to go through lengthy and expensive legal processes to get back their status as citizens of India. Many people, both Hindus, and Muslims, committed suicide in different parts of the state. The updation of NRC brought further troubles for them as many uneducated people from the rural areas struggled to produce documents dating back to 1971.
Due to these trying circumstances, the community has welcomed the bill, with the hope that such legislation would put an end to their misery and would actually usher in ‘achhe din’ for them. However, the extreme opposition to the bill from many parts of the Brahmaputra Valley has put the community in a spot, with no clarity on the right way forward.
Unlike the Bengali speaking migrant Muslims of Assam, the Bengali Hindus are not represented by any strong political force. While the Badruddin Ajmal led All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) unanimously speaks for the Muslim community and wields reasonable clout in many parts of the state, the Bengali Hindus have no such representation. They have traditionally aligned with the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). However, the BJP has much larger political ambitions in the state and wishes to woo both the Bengali and Assamese speaking Hindus of Assam, which, in the current scenario seems extremely difficult.
The current imbroglio can change only if there is a thorough analysis of exactly how many Bengali Hindus reside in the state and how many are ‘illegal’ residents if the cutoff date of March 24, 1971, is taken into consideration. That would give away the exact number of people who would have to be regularised if the Citizenship Amendment Bill is actually to be implemented. The final declaration of the NRC may give some statistical insight into the issue.
In addition, it must also be analyzed as to exactly how many Bengali Hindus have been given employment by the Government of Assam in the last four decades and how many Bengali medium schools or college departments have been opened. The number of Bengali newspapers and books published also should be looked into. The data emanating from such a study would completely demolish the smear campaign that the Assamese language and culture are being threatened by the Bengalis.
In the absence of any credible data, hyper-nationalism and jingoism have taken over the political discourse of the state. Sections of leaders in both Brahmaputra and Barak Valleys are making irresponsible statements to fan further hatred. Some of the television channels based in Guwahati are playing an extremely partisan role and giving platforms to such intolerant elements. Interestingly, the vitriol and hatred visible on television and even social media are not always seen on the ground. Assamese – Bengali marriages are now accepted socially and solemnized with wholehearted participation. Cultural exchanges are also common. Assamese singers, such as Zubeen Garg, are very popular in the Barak Valley and the Assamese intelligentsia loves reading Bengali literature. Noted Bengali litterateur Shirshendu Mukherjee recently visited Guwahati as one of the guests of the Guwahati Book Fair.
The solution certainly lies in the promotion of amity and brotherhood. Assam has been dissected three times since independence, more than any other state of India. It can move forward only if it is appreciated that the state is a multilingual and multi-ethnic entity with many communities living together.