Tura (Meghalaya), Dec 5 (IANS): The Garo Student's Union (GSU) on Thursday appealed to the Central government not to introduce the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2019 in Parliament in order to thwart a more "radicalised militancy in the northeastern states".
The appeal from the GSU, one of the constituents of the North East Student's Organisation came a day after the Union Cabinet approved to amend the Citizenship Act, 1955 to provide Indian nationality to Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, Parsis, Jains and Buddhists fleeing persecution in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.
"GSU appeals to central government not to table the dangerous bill like Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 because it will really be a 'cab' to ferry Bangladeshis to North East. It is the neglect of the successive central governments and basically of influx that North East has seen numerous militant oragnisations. Let us hope and pray that Citizenship (Amendment) Bill will not usher in a more radicalised militancy in North East," GSU president Tengsak G. Momin said.
Alleging that the central government is unsympathetic to the plight of North East, Momin said, "the BJP is just concentrating on Hindu Rashtra Movement while we the indigenous peoples of North East will be facing an existential threat."
"Perhaps the Mizos are right about their slogan 'Bye-bye India, Hello China' because after 'Bangladisation' of North East it will definitely be 'Bye-bye India, Hello Bangladesh' because we will be living with so many Bangladeshis in our own land," the GSU leader noted.
Further, he said that the introduction of the bill is to protect the illegal Hindu immigrants not simply to give refuge to persecuted minorities from six religions while persecuting in India itself the people belonging to the same religion under the Hindu Rashtra movement.
Reiterating its strong opposition against the Citizenship bill, Momin said, "We will fight tooth and nail against the destructive policy which will effect a drastic demographic change and will be pursuing for agitation programmes all over North East to mark our protest."