GUWAHATI, Sept 28 - To ensure that there was no more damage to the socio-political, economic and cultural interests of the Assamese and indigenous people of the state, all illegal migrants who had entered Assam post-March 24, 1971 must be deported as per the Assam Accord, writer and political analyst Prof Deven Dutta said on Saturday.
�Religion or language cannot be a basis here and such an approach will damage the fundamental features of the Constitution of India. The state has no room for accommodating any illegal foreigners,� he said.
Dutta, who has made a written representation before the chairman of the Clause 6 Implementation High Level Committee under the Assam Accord Implementation Department, following a request by the committee, said he did not believe in having two separate dates for determination of citizenship � one for Assam and one for the rest of the country � but that �the political realities over a long span of time has made many to accept March 25, 1971 as the cut-off date�.
Dutta said that in view of the wide-ranging allegations about the just-published NRC being faulty, both the Centre and the State government should take steps for rectifying them.
�The voters list should be prepared on the basis of a correct NRC. In short, no foreigner should be allowed to vote in the country�s elections,� he said.
Thirdly, persons not having their names in the 1951 NRC and the 1952 voters list and their succeeding generations should be prevented from contesting the panchayat, municipality, Assembly or Parliament elections. The documents of all migrants who had entered Assam and India before the cut-off date of March 25, 1971, must also be put to stringent scrutiny.
On the definition of �indigenous�, Dutta suggested that the people who had lived in Assam prior to Assam�s annexation by the British under the Yandaboo Treaty and their succeeding generations be recognised as indigenous.
The term �Assamese�, he said, should include those people and their successors who had been living within the boundary of present-day Assam before India�s independence and using Assamese or any other local ethnic language as mother tongue.
Dutta suggested that all third and fourth-grade posts in Central and State government and semi-government and private undertakings must be filled up by local people.
�The entire administrative and academic set-up of all the vernacular medium public schools must be strengthened. Assamese, the official language of the state, must be made a compulsory subject in all Central schools and other private schools functioning in the state,� he added.
Dutta said the neglected relics and monuments reflecting the glorious past of the various ancient and medieval kingdoms of Assam should be preserved and protected.
