GUWAHATI, May 14 — Accusing the Congress, the Left and ‘people with vested interests like Madani’ of being ‘busy’ playing the communal card over the issue of repeal of the IMDT Act, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) today said that it is against the communalising of this issue.
BJP’s organisation in-charge for the North East states V Satish, in a statement today took strong exception to the statement reportedly made by Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi terming the decision of the Union Cabinet to repeal the Act as a political gimmick. He said that the Chief Minister should have thought twice before wing such language in criticising the BJP’s initiative.
Satish said that it is the Congress and the Left who have been ‘harping on minority vote bank’ and therefore consistently opposing any more to repeal this “draconian, highly discriminatory black laid”. The BJP leader said that when things are moving in such a dangerous direction and Assam has undergone demographic charge, it is ridiculous that efforts are still being made by Gogoi to underplay the whole issue. If the continued influx is not checked in time, the country may witness another partition, he warned.
Satish said that instead of seeing reason, the Congress and Left are still busy in ‘encashing the vote banks’ in order to garner political mileage out of it. These parties should have supported the repeal move in the greater national interest, he stated. He said that after repeatedly requesting and urging the Congress and Communist parties, the BJP-led NDA government has taken this decision, ‘So the question of consulting the Chief Minister does not arise at all. Satish said that Gogoi’s complaint that he has not been consulted is nothing but a ploy to gain sympathy from ‘this vote bank’.
The BJP leader said that the people of Assam and outside are convinced that the IMDT Act should go ‘lock, stock and barrel’. Even after spending crores of Rupees, the tribunals set up for detecting the illeged migrants have failed to deliver the goods. Since 1983, only about 1500 people have been reportedly deported after their detection. This is because of the faulty provision of the law, which has not helped to detect the illegal migrants but helped establish themselves, Satish said.