Image: Northeast Now

With the dropouts of 19 lakhs of names from the NRC list, the rage and anguish among many, is slowly coming out in the open in Assam’s Barak valley.

Members of All Assam Bengali Hindu Association (AABHA), staged a strong protest under the statue of Khudiram Bose in Silchar on Monday evening.

Also read: Assam: Over 500 people of Tezpur village did not figure in NRC

They also called for the resignation of the elected BJP leaders of Barak valley, both, in the State Assembly as well as in Parliament.

Members of AABHA reiterated that this NRC list is full of mistakes, for which, the ‘axe’ mostly has fallen upon ‘Bengali Hindus’.

Also read: Assam: People excluded from NRC ready for a fresh struggle

Members of AABHA, echoed in unison that the faith reposed by Hindu Bengalis upon the BJP that led to them winning six Assembly seats out of the seven in Cachar district alone in 2016, and this year, winning both the seats of Lok Sabha, was a ‘catastrophic blunder’.

Before the beginning of the NRC process, these elected representatives of the BJP assured of standing by Hindu Bengalis that have voted them to power.

But today, they are silent on this whole issue, said the members of AABHA.

Also read: Over one lakh STs excluded from NRC: Rights group

Senior journalist and poet, Atin Das, expressing his views on this issue, said, “Even after submitting valid documents a large section of Bengali Hindus’ names, did not come up in the list.”

“This goes to show that this is not a National Register of Citizens (NRC), rather, Assamese Register of Citizens,” he added.

“The voices being raised against the elected BJP representatives are justified, as they have ‘cheated’ the Hindu Bengali voters of this valley,” Das also said.

Also read: Assam: Names of 1414 indigenous families of Hojai missing from NRC

“Both at the Centre as well as in Assam, BJP is running the government, yet in this State only, the ‘dual notification’ issued by the Narendra Modi led government in 2015 has not been implemented,” added Das.

President of AABHA, Basudev Sharma, speaking to Northeast Now, said, “Out of the 19 lakh names that has been left out from the list, 11 lakh names belong to the members of the Hindu community, but, in India, a member of the Hindu community can never be a ‘foreigner’.”

Also read: NRC: The journey of a historical consensus

Basudev Sharma added, “By voting the BJP to power we have made a big mistake. Even after getting a grand opportunity to implement the dual notification out here in Assam, intentionally this order has been left out of this state, while, promulgated in many other states of India.”

Sharma further informed, “Along with the grave issue of NRC for the Bengali Hindus, the likely implementation of Clause 6 of the Assam Accord hangs over our head.”

“Our identity in Assam would be wiped out with it, for which, AABHA along with Bengali Hindus of Barak valley, would never accept this erroneous NRC list.” said, Sharma.

Aniruddha Laskar is the Chief of Bureau, South Assam &and Mizoram. He can be reached at - [email protected]