By Tarique Anwar, TwoCircles.net,
Guwahati (Assam): Badruddin Ajmal, president of Asom United Democratic Front (AUDF), has condemned some local student organizations’ move to dub all poor people and labourers from one community as Bangladeshis and harass them.
Talking to TwoCircles.net Badruddin Ajmal, president of Asom United Democratic Front (AUDF), said: “Workers of these organizations are openly demonstrating brutality against Muslims and police and whole administration are mute spectators. When they see any Muslim family or elderly person with beard and cap on their head they start beating them without any respect of age.”
There is no security of Muslim women in the state. These activists enter any house of a Muslim and beat the women, children and misbehave with elderly person and finally hand over them alleging them as foreigners, Ajmal said.
“We are also not supporting any infiltration or illegal stay of Bagladeshi in our country but at the same time we will not allow these organizations to take law in their hands,” he said. Why the government does not seal border to check infiltration. There is no dispute that if there is any Bangladeshi in the state he should be pushed back. But in the name of identifying foreigners, dubbing all the poor people and daily wage earners from one community as Bangladeshis and harassing them is not only unfortunate but unacceptable,” said Ajmal.
Seven persons said to be Bangladeshis were held in Pulibore area of Jorhat on 8 August by AJYCP activists and finally handed over to the police, said Ajmal. This episode has been one for several decades but till now the government has not prepared any concrete policy to solve this issue. In fact no government wants to solve it. All of them use this issue as an election agenda to come in power, he continued.
Always in election time this problem has been created and innocent Muslims have been harassed in the name of infiltration. These incidents of torture by these organizations are continuing for last 15 days but the Congress government is not taking any strong action to prevent these goons from harassing Muslims of the state, said Ajmal.
An order was passed in 1985 by the Supreme Court to identify foreigners and to deport them but it was finally scrapped by the government. Under IMDT act of 1983 Praful Mahanta of Asom Gaun Parishad (AGP) 700 people identified as foreigners and deported from the country in proper manner and we want that type of act again, Ajmal told TCN.
Attacking on the Congress government he said in fact no government wants to solve it. There is no restriction on BJP and VHP there. Every day they give derogative statements against Muslims and provoke people. Some days ago VHP issued a statement that all Bangladeshis should be killed which is most inappreciable and provoking remark, he said.
Badruddin Ajmal who is also state president of Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind said that the Assam unit of Jamiat Ulama decided to convene a conclave of “secular intellectuals” from across the state here on August 19 to discuss the foreigners issue and hammer out “practical ways” to deal with the problem.
The AUDF on 8th August submitted a memorandum to the governor, asking him to put a stop to the harassment of genuine Indian citizens and make sure the foreigners are detected and deported through a legal procedure, he said.
The party also demanded the immediate upgrading of the National Register of Citizens.
Meanwhile, the minority cell of the ruling Congress has warned the government against allowing All Asom Students Union (AASU) and Asom Jatiyatabadi Yuba Chatra Parishad (AJYCP) to harass people of Muslim minority community in the name of “identifying foreigners.”
The Congress minority cell has decided to set up legal aid committee in every district in the state to help genuine citizens defend their case in foreigners’ tribunals when their nationality is challenged.