MORIGAON, June 8 – The Cabinet Sub-Committee formed by the Government of Assam to study the demand for inclusion of Tiwa, Mising and Rabha autonomous councils into the Sixth Schedule of Indian Constitution visited Morigaon on June 5. The committee headed by Dr Bhumidhar Barman, Minister for Health comprising another three Cabinet ministers of Assam government met several Tiwa organisations, public representatives and examined the demand of 6th schedule autonomy to Tiwas.
As many as six organisations namely – All Tiwa Students’ Union (ATSU), Autonomy Demand Struggling Forum (ADSF), Sadou Asom Tiwa Sanmilan, Tiwa Sahitya Sabha, Tiwa Cultural Society and All Tiwa Women Association (ATWA) submitted a memorandum to the Cabinet Sub-Committee demanding the dissolution of interim body of the Tiwa Autonomous Council and formation of a new autonomous council immediately in consultation with the agitating Tiwa organisations.
In the memorandum, the agitating Tiwa organisations raised the demand for inclusion of all Tiwa-dominated areas into the proposed Sixth Schedule Tiwa Autonomous Council. The memorandum alleged that Tiwa areas were divided politically from time to time. The ancient Gobha State of Tiwa (Lalung) including its tributary principalities namely Khala, Nellie, Topakuchi, Dimoria etc., were annexed into the British Empire in 1835 AD at the time of the reign of Raja Shutur Sing. It was at that time the Tiwa area were divided into hills and plains. The plains portion was added with Nagaon district hills part was retained with Jaintia hills, the memorandum referred.
Again, the hills area of Tiwas were divided at the time of transfer of Block-I and Block-II to Karbi Anglong (the then Mikir hills). Block-II predominantly inhabited by the Tiwas (Lalung) and there was debate about the inclusion of the said area into the newly-created Mikir hills in 1952. Now, the Tiwa organisations demanded that one time divided areas (areas of Karbi Anglong and Shari Krai (Saw Raid) of Meghalaya) should be reumited within one administrative setup in the form of Autonomous Council under the provision of 6th Schedule of Indian Constitution. The Tiwa organisation reiterated their demand that an arrangement should be made in the proposed Sixth Schedule Tiwa Council area for the provision of Article 332(2) of the Constitution to enable making representation to legislative Assembly from Tiwa Committee.