GUWAHATI, April 6 — The Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) under the provisions of amended Sixth Schedule of the Constitution of India, is likely to be formed in the first part of May. The State Assembly has already passed a Bill for repealing the Bodoland Autonomous Council Act to pave the way for creation of the BTC. Official sources said that the Bill for amending the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution would be placed in Parliament shortly and with both the Congress and BJP supporting the same, there should not be any hurdle in passing the Bill. The interim BTC executive council is likely to be headed by the Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT) chief Hagrama Basumatary and the BLT is holding talks with other Bodo mass organisations on the composition of the interim council.
The BLT vice-chairman Kamal Mushahary said that along with the Bill to amend the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution, the Bill to include Bodo language in the 8th Schedule of the Constitution is also scheduled to be placed before the Parliament shortly. A delegation of the BLT will go to New Delhi tomorrow to meet the Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani and officials of the Ministry of Home Affairs to expedite the whole process. A delegation of the BLT also met Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on March 31 to discuss various issues relating to formation of the BTC. Sri Mushahary said that the State Government has played its part to pave the way for formation of the BTC by repealing the BAC Act but reorganisation of the districts to create four contiguous districts may take some time. He said that the State Government has already written to the Election Commission for its clearance for reorganising the districts and the Union Home Ministry has also written to the Election Commission in this regard. “With both the Central and State Governments taking up the issue, we hope that the Election Commission will give the necessary clearance soon,” the BLT vice-chairman added.
During his meeting with the BLT leaders, the Chief Minister assured that the process of withdrawal of cases against the BLT activists has been initiated but completion of the process would take sometime. Official sources said that the State Government has already started preparing the list of cases against the BLT men and the Chief Minister also had discussion with the Advocate General in this regard. However, withdrawal of all the cases would take some time and the Government would adopt a liberal approach in this regard.
On the rehabilitation of the BLT cadres, official sources said that the BLT has about 2,300 to 2,400 cadres and the Government has already made it quite clear that it would not be possible to provide Government jobs to all of them. However, the Centre is ready to help the BTC in taking up self-employment schemes for the rehabilitation of the BLT cadres. The BLT vice-chairman, on the other hand, said that ‘meaningful rehabilitation’ of the cadres would be one of the main targets of the BTC. He revealed that the BLT leadership has already started the process of preparing a district-wise list of all the cadres with details of their qualification so that the BTC can start the process of rehabilitation as soon as the interim council is formed. It may be mentioned here that as per the provisions of the memorandum of settlement, signed between the Central and State Governments and the BLT, the militant outfit would be disbanded immediately after the formation of the interim council.
Meanwhile, the president of the All Bodo Students’ Union (ABSU) Rabi Ram Narzary told this correspondent that the organisation is satisfied with the progress of implementation of the Bodo Accord. He, however, said that the issue of ST status to Bodos in Karbi Anglong should be settled during the current Parliament session. He also demanded that the State and Central Governments should demarcate the boundary of the BTC as soon as possible. Sri Narzary also described the opposition to granting of ST status to Bodos in Karbi Anglong by some organisations of the hill district as unfortunate.