Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday cited a 2005 Supreme Court judgement to defend his recent remarks targeting Miya Muslims in the state, saying that acknowledging the “reality” is neither hatred nor communalism but a recognition of a “grave and long-standing” problem.
The BJP leader has been repeatedly claiming over the past few days that Miya Muslims will be deleted as voters during the special revision of the electoral rolls in the state, and that it was his job to “make them suffer”.
In Assam, “Miya” is a derogatory word used to refer to undocumented immigrants and is exclusively directed at Muslims of Bengali origin. They are often accused of being undocumented migrants from Bangladesh.
Once a pejorative in Assam, from the common use of the honorific “Miya” among South Asian Muslims, the term has now been reappropriated by the community as a self-descriptor to refer to Muslims who migrated to Assam from Bengal during the colonial era.
In a post on social media on Thursday, Sarma said that those who were questioning him about his remarks about the community should “pause and read” what the court had said about Assam while striking down the 1983 Illegal Migrants Determination by Tribunals Act in 2005.
The Act was enacted in 1983 to identify and deport undocumented immigrants, primarily from Bangladesh, residing in Assam. It established special tribunals to determine the status of “illegal” immigrants who arrived on or after March 25, 1971.
The legislation was meant to expedite the detection and deportation of “illegal” immigrants. The provisions of the Act, however, placed the burden of proof on the state and not the accused.
In 2005, the court struck down the law after hearing a petition filed by former Chief Minister and BJP leader Sarbananda Sonowal. The petition had contended that the provisions of the 1983 law for identifying foreigners were so stringent that few persons had been declared as such and deported.
On Thursday, Sarma claimed that the court had warned that a “silent and invidious demographic invasion of Assam” may lead to the loss of the “geostrategically vital” districts of lower Assam.
The chief minister added that the court had observed that the “influx of illegal migrants is turning these districts into a Muslim majority region…it will then only be a matter of time when a demand for their merger with Bangladesh may be made”.
The Supreme Court had not made these remarks but was quoting them in its judgement from a 1998 report submitted by Lieutenant General SK Sinha (Retired), the Governor of Assam, at the time.
The chief minister said that when the highest constitutional court of the country used “words like “demographic invasion” and warned of the possible loss of territory and national unity, acknowledging that “reality” was neither hatred nor communalism or an attack on any community.
He added: “It is a recognition of a grave and long-standing problem that Assam has lived with for decades.”
Reacting to Sarma’s statement, Congress leader Gaurav Gogoi said that the chief minister is “misusing the name of the Supreme Court”.
“The language he quotes is not the Supreme Court’s,” Gogoi said on social media. “The…court neither authored the said words nor adopted it. To pass off an executive report as judicial pronouncement is a deliberate contempt.”
A chief minister, a constitutional office, to “falsely attribute words to the…Supreme Court is not just contemptuous, it is an assault on constitutional propriety and institutional integrity”, the Assam Congress chief added.
Congress spokesperson Aman Wadud also noted that the Supreme Court judgement was based on a report by former Assam Governor SK Sinha. “Based on which empirical data did SK Sinha came to the conclusion of large scale illegal migration?” he asked.
Wadud also asked how many “demands for merger” with Bangladesh have been made since Sinha warned of such a possibility 28 years ago.
“The people you are calling Miyan are Indian citizens , migrated way before partition,” the Congress spokesperson said. “Half a million migrated a few years before 1930 – according to census commissioner CS Mullan.”
State’s actions not against any religion, claims CM
Nevertheless, Sarma on Thursday claimed that the state government’s actions were not against any religion or any Indian citizen.
“Our effort is to protect Assam’s identity, security, and future, exactly as the Supreme Court cautioned the nation to do,” he added. “Ignoring that warning would be the real injustice – to Assam and to India.”
Sarma’s remarks on Thursday came a day after he said that BJP workers had filed more than five lakh complaints against suspected foreigners during the special revision of the electoral rolls in the state.
The Election Commission is separately conducting a “special revision” of the voter list in the state, which is similar to the usual updates to the electoral roll. Assam is not among the 12 states and Union Territories where the poll panel is conducting the special intensive revision of the electoral rolls.
The state is expected to hold Assembly elections in three to four months.
Several Opposition parties have accused the BJP of conspiring to delete the names of a large number of genuine voters from the state’s electoral rolls amid the special revision and filed police complaints.
On Wednesday, Sarma claimed that four lakh to five lakh Miya voters would be deleted when the special intensive revision of the voter rolls takes place in the state, and acknowledged that the BJP was attempting to prevent them from voting.
“What does ‘vote chori’ [vote theft] mean to us?” the chief minister had asked reporters. “Yes, we are trying to steal some Miya votes. Ideally, they should not be allowed to vote in Assam. They should be able to vote in Bangladesh.”
Reacting to Sarma’s comments, Congress leader Aman Wadud had said that Sarma had “made the Constitution absolutely ineffective” in Assam.
On January 24, the chief minister said that only Miya Muslims were being served notices under the special revision in the state.
Corrections and clarifications: An earlier version of this article incorrectly attributed statements on demographic changes in Assam to the Supreme Court. The statements were not authored by the court but were quoted in the 2005 judgement from a report submitted in 1998 by the then governor of Assam.
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