Assam will boil if advanced communities are given ST status: DD Narzary

Our Correspondent

Kokrajhar: Working president of Bodoland Janajati Suraksha Mancha (BJSM) DD Narzary on Friday warned that Assam will boil with protest programmes by indigenous tribal people if the government includes advanced communities in the schedule tribe list.

In a statement, DD Narzary said, “The Central government is going ahead with the proposal to include six advanced and heterogeneous communities in the ST list by bringing fresh amendment to the bill. He said six communities of Assam who are seeking ST status do not fulfil the required criteria of being STs as they are migrants from other States.”

“The tribal people are backward in all spheres, have characteristics of shyness of contact with other people and have distinct culture and traditions,” he said adding that they want to live in geographically isolated places. He also said most of the people who are demanding ST status in Assam had migrated from West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Rongpur, Chattishgargh, etc., having separate categories in their respective States.

Narzary said the non- notified communities had created disturbance among the tribal communities and they are exploiting the benefits of tribal people. “The non-tribal people have illegally encroached tribal lands, snatched all business opportunities, jobs and other facilities,” he said adding that the real indigenous tribal people will not be saved but be extinct if advanced and populous communities are included in the ST list.

The BJSM leader reiterated that Kokrajhar MP Naba Kumar Sarania, who was working against the interest of tribal people, was not a tribal but became MP from a reserved ST seat with a fake ST certificate. He said the issue of a fake ST certificate to non-tribal people has became a matter of concern as these non-notified communities are fomenting trouble in tribal land.

He said the communities were not given ST status on the basis of demand but granted on the basis of specific character, distinct identity, tradition and culture and diminishing population. He also said the people who basically migrated from other States or country cannot demand ST status in tribal belts. He warned that the entire tribal people of the State will go for massive agitation against the move for enlisting six communities in the ST list.

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