Citizenship Bill fuelling fresh spurt among youths to take up arms: Debabrata Saikia

GUWAHATI: The Leader of the Opposition in the Assam Legislative Assembly, Debabrata Saikia on Wednesday said that the recent admission by the Director General (Special Branch) of Assam Police that resentment against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 was fuelling a fresh spurt among the young people joining the ULFA (Independent), is nothing short of a confirmation of the Sarbananda Sonowal-led government’s failure to protect Assam’s interests and its tendency to betray people.

In a release, Saikia said that ULFA’s popularity had gradually waned during the decade-and-a-half when the Congress was in power in the state. Contrary, the Centre’s decision to table the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 and the Assam Chief Minister’s failure in many fronts has induced a section of young boys and girls to take up arms against the State.

He said that dwindling employment opportunities and stagnation of development activities like the MGNREGA are also creating frustration and resentment among many youth, who are gravitating towards the ULFA (Independent) as a result.

Referring the all-round failure of the State government, Saikia pointed out that although Sonowal keeps talking about “Zero tolerance of corruption”, yet the Chief Minister has only resorted to superficial whitewashing and has been unable to muster the courage to conduct a CBI inquiry into the widespread reports of several syndicates operating in the state to smuggle coal, stone, sand, ‘supari’ (dried areca nut) and others.

Saikia cautioned that Assam will slide back to the days of violence and lack of development if the government led by Sonowal does not pull up its socks.

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