The Bharatiya Gorkha Parisangh (BGP) has welcomed the Assam government’s decision not to prosecute Gorkhas under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
“The cabinet decision will come as a huge relief for the families of Gorkha people who have been prosecuted under the citizenship law,” BGP secretary Nanda Kirati Dewan said in a statement.
“It would also remove the tag of illegal immigrants or foreigners from members of the community who are original inhabitants of Assam and are Bonafide Indian citizens,” Dewan added.
At least 22,000 Gorkhas in Assam have been marked as D-voters in the electoral rolls since 1997, the BGP said.
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“The community wants that the D-voter tag on Gorkhas should be removed by the implementation of the cabinet decision so that they can exercise their right to vote in the forthcoming by-elections in the state,” Dewan further said in the statement.
Over one lakh Gorkhas were left out of the final NRC list that was published on August 31, 2019, due to the D-voter issue but they had decided under the aegis of the BGP not to go to FTs to prove their citizenship, the statement said.