COURTESY TIMES OF INDIA DEC 20

Living in fear, ready to quit: BJP MLAs
Assam Netas To CM: Talk To PM, End Crisis
TNN & AGENCIES

Guwahati:

Twelve Assam BJP legislators on Thursday met chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal and urged him to convince Prime Minister Narendra Modi to resolve the crisis that has gripped the state in the wake of the enactment of the amended Citizenship Act.

The MLAs also asked Sonowal to allay fears of the people and tell them how the state government planned to protect their language and culture. “We have appealed to the chief minister to come forward with clarity on how he planned to safeguard the Assamese people,” Sootea MLA Padma Hazarika, who led the group, said.

“Houses of many party leaders, workers and MLAs, including mine, have been attacked. We have been abused and many of our workers cannot come out of their homes. As far as I know, all party workers want illegal Bangladeshis to be identified and deported from the state,” a PTI report quoted Hazarika as saying. There is “mistrust in BJP and its members” he said, adding that anger against BJP MLAs has aggravated due to certain statements made by some ministers. However, he refused to name these ministers.

“People of Assam are in fear and so are we (BJP legislators). We couldn’t come out of our homes for eight days since the beginning of the protests,” said BJP’s Dibrugarh MLA Prasanta Phukan, whose house was attacked by protesters.

The legislators said CAA was the party’s policy and they could not go against it, but there were ways to protect the culture and language of the Assamese people. “People in our respective constituencies are demanding our resignations and I want to assure them that if our resignations can resolve the problem then we are prepared to resign,” Hazarika said.

The legislators said they discussed with the chief minister immediate steps to grant tribal status to the six communities of the state. They urged him to get a resolution passed by the cabinet stating Assamese would remain as the state language forever.

Hours later, the CM’s office said the government would submit a recommendation of the group of ministers seeking Schedule Tribes (ST) status to Moran, Motok, Chutia, Koch-Rajbongshi, Tai-Ahom communities, along with the state’s tea tribes, within January.

“Moreover, Rs 125 crore each would be provided to Ahom, Chutia, Moran and Motok areas, covering four districts in the state, for generating self-employment opportunities, infrastructure development, preservation of monuments, and archaeological heritage, etc. An autonomous council would be constituted for the Koch-Rajbongshi community in the undivided Goalpara district, along with autonomous councils for Moran and Motok communities in the state,” the CM’s office said