North East Forum for Indigenous People (NEFIP) has appealed to central leaders not to take the northeast people for a ride with rhetorical assurance but to address the concerns of the region with utmost seriousness and pragmatic approach.

NEFIP’s reaction was in the backdrop of a recent statement by the union home minister of India cum president of BJP, Amit Shah at the fourth conclave of the BJP led North East Democratic Alliance at Guwahati on September 9, attended by the chief ministers of eight northeast states including Sikkim. 

Amit Shah said that the proposed Citizenship Amendment Bill, CAB, will not be in conflict with the Inner Line Permit legislation enforce in some north east states nor would it contradict with existing laws pertaining to safeguarding the identities, culture and customs of the indigenous people of the region. He went on to add that CAB will not affect Article 371 and asserted that it is only intended to expel all illegal immigrants not just from Assam but the entire country.

While welcoming the assurance made by union home minister, Amit Shah to protect and safeguard indigenous people of northeast and to remove all illegal immigrants from the entire region, the forum which represents the indigenous population of the north eastern region of India alleged that it finds Amit Shah’s assurance empty, misleading and double standard. 

NEFIP asserted that since the very concept of the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2016, CAB, which the BJP is preparing to push through in the Parliament, is an attempt to naturalize citizenship of illegal immigrants in the region.

Explaining its strong opposition to CAB in its present form, NEFIP pointed out that CAB seeks to legalize illegal hindus, jains, sikhs, buddhists, parsis and christians immigrants who had entered India from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. It further stated that the Third Schedule of the 1995 Act is proposed to be amended to decrease the residency requirement from 11 years to six years.

It further said that the CAB, 2016 seeks to make drastic changes in the citizenship and immigration norms of the country by relaxing the criteria to become an Indian citizen for all non-muslim communities. 

NEFIP reiterated that the present CAB, 2016 is an attempt to legitimize the defaulters and is prima facie unconstitutional and against Article 14 (Right to Equality) of the constitution as it corrupts the basic concept of secularism as per the doctrine of the basic structure of the constitution of India.

NEFIP said that it is totally incorrect to believe that the people of the northeast do not know what will benefit them or not and imposition of bi-power despite the opposition to it is nothing but a hangover of the colonial mindset and interior colonization to enforce a strict demographic hierarchy by suppressing the indigenous people of the northeast region which will be factor to further the distance between the northeast region from the mainstream.

The Citizenship Act of 1955 denies citizenship rights to any illegal immigrant, whereby an illegal immigrant is defined as a person who enters India without a valid passport or with forged documents or a person who stays in the country beyond the visa permit.