MIRZA, Nov 7 � The Deputy Commissioner, Kamrup, DJ Balaji said that adequate measures have been taken to hold free-and-fair elections in the Rabha Hasong Autonomous Council areas in Kamrup district despite threats by several non-tribal bodies against the elections.
�Joint operations by police, Army and CRPF are being conducted in the RHAC areas, including the Assam-Meghalaya border areas to prevent any violence during or ahead of the elections in the RHAC. Moreover, the police have been instructed to strictly maintaining the law-and-order situation in the RHAC, he said and added that force movements have also been intensified so that people gain confidence in casting their votes. All out efforts are on to hold free, fair and peaceful polls,� Balaji told The Assam Tribune today.
He said that polling booths have been identified in respect of their sensitiveness and police pickets would be deployed soon in every polling booth. Polling personnel would be escorted while going to and coming from the booths for preventing any untoward incidents during the polls, he added.
The DC said that the district administration had held several rounds of talks with leaders of various tribal and non-tribal groups for the purpose of holding peaceful elections in the RHAC and today also a detailed meeting was held with all political parties, requesting their cooperation for the smooth conduct of the election as per the rules of the Election Commission.
Regarding the agitation by a section of non-tribal organisations demanding exclusion of villages with non-tribal majority from the RHAC before the council elections, the DC said that altogether 13 villages with 100 percent non-tribal population have already been excluded from the RHAC and that non-tribal voters of 45 villages in Kamrup district have also been bifurcated as per the directives of the Election Commission.
�It is not possible to delete the tribal voters from the RHAC � which is a tribal council � and the tribal communities, including Garo communities, could not be excluded from the council election,� he clarified.
He appealed the public to extend their cooperation to the district administration for peaceful conduct of the council election in the RHAC.
It may be mentioned here that the Garo community, a tribal community, has been agitating along with other non-tribal communities, demanding exclusion of the villages with non-tribal and Garo majority from the RHAC before the council elections, disrupting normal life and triggering bloodshed in the RHAC areas during the past several days in Kamrup and Goalpara districts. The organisations have also threatened of a janata curfew from November 12 to 25 opposing the elections in RHAC areas.
