Guwahati, May 11: Putting up a joint front against the Centre’s decision to scrap the Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunals) Act, over a dozen minority organisations today formed a coordination committee to stall the move by highlighting the inherent dangers it posed to religious and linguistic minorities of the state.
The United Minority Coordination Committee, formed under the chief convenorship of United Minority Front president Hafiz Rashid Choudhury, will take up a series of “nationwide” programmes to spread awareness about New Delhi’s move to scrap the Act.
The committee will also urge President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam not to put his seal of approval on any Bill seeking to scrap the Act in Parliament.
Rashid said they would inform the President “about how scrapping of the Act would ‘jeopardise’ the safety and security of religious and linguistic minorities in the state”.
The committee said it would hold seminars in New Delhi before the next session of Parliament, where the Bill would be taken up for discussion, to mobilise public opinion on the issue.
The committee will also approach the leaders and MPs of all political parties, barring the BJP, to fight against passing of the Bill in Parliament.
Some minority leaders have established contacts with NDA leaders like Chandrababu Naidu and Sharad Yadav.
Within three weeks from today, the committee plans to hold a meeting of all “secular and democratic” organisations in the stateIt will give final shape to its “stall IMDT Act repeal programme” in the meeting.
The need to float a united front against the Centre’s decision was felt after a 12-hour Assam bandh, called by three minority organisations, yesterday failed to evoke any response barring in some minority pockets.
The committee observed that only the IMDT Act could provide “judicial safeguard” from harassment to genuine Indian citizens. It said the Foreigners’ Act had no provision under which a doubtful citizen could prove his citizenship.
The committee pointed out that in its proposal to repeal the IMDT Act, the NDA government had also not mentioned whether the Foreigners’ Act would be amended to provide a person with legal provision to ascertain his Indian citizenship.
At today’s meeting, the organisations appealed to minority communities not to get provoked by the BJP’s “sinister” design to create “communal tension” in the state with an eye on next year’s general election.
Some of the prominent minority organisations whose representatives attended the meeting are the United Minority Front, the Citizens’ Rights Protection Committee, the All-Assam Minority Students’ Union, the All-Assam Bengali Yuva Chatra Federation, the Assam Unit of Milli Council and the United Minority Development Council.
The Samata Party, a key constituent of the NDA government, also attended the meeting.