Assam Legislative Assembly: House has Serious Discussion on D-Voter Menace

Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI: The Opposition MLAs in the Assam Legislative Assembly (ALA) expressed concern over, as they say, the border police rampantly referring genuine Indian citizens to foreigners tribunals (FTs) by tagging them as ‘D’ voters. The opposition MLAs said that they had no objection to the detection and deportation of foreigners. They, however, made it clear that the ‘ongoing’ harassment of genuine Indians in the name of a drive against ‘D’ voters must stop.

AIUDF MLA Aminul Islam (senior) raised this issue in the house under Rule 50 today. He said, “If the border police doubt a person’s citizenship credentials, they should go to the person and verify his or her citizenship-related documents. They can also verify the citizenship credentials of the person with the gaon burah. If they are not satisfied with the documents, they can refer such cases to the FTs. However, a section of border police personnel picks and chooses the names of some people from the voter list on their whims and fancies and refers them to the FTs.”

Manoranjan Talukdar of the CPI (M) said, “D voters comprise Hindu Bengalis and minority people. How is it possible that a person in a family is tagged as a D voter and other members of the family are not? This exemplifies that the system has some lapses somewhere.”

Nurul Huda of the Congress said, “The D voter tag has led to the declaration of many people as foreigners, and they have been languishing in detention camps. When such a person dies in the detention camp, why do the police send the body to the village from where he was picked up and not to Bangladesh? Since he is a declared foreigner (Bangladeshi), his body should have been sent to Bangladesh.”

Gobinda Basumatary of the UPPL said, “When the government is sure that a person is a foreigner, he should be deported to his country. There’s no reason to keep him in detention camps for a long time.”

Ashraful Hussain of the AIUDF said, “The D voter tagging in the voter list started in 1997 by an instruction from the Election Commission of India. The D voter tag deprives a person of all citizenship rights. Since it is a political problem, it needs a political solution.”

Independent MLA Akhil Gogoi said, “Had the government finalised the NRC, this problem would have been resolved. Those making their names in the NRC are Indians, and others are not. In the absence of any extradition treaty between India and Bangladesh, the deportation of Bangladeshi citizens from India often hits a roadblock. This house should take a resolution on this issue and send it to the central government.”

Denying harassment by border police, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary said, “If a D voter feels that he has been meted out with injustice, he can move the high court and the Supreme Court of India to prove his Indian citizenship. The border police refer such cases to FTs only when they don’t get prima facie evidence of a person being an Indian citizen.” 

Also Read: Assam: 54,411 ‘D’ voters declared foreigners in state

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