Urgent Need to Contain the Demographic Invasion This silent invasion of the NE states has been taking place for several decades and the Govt has failed to stem this demographic onslaught. What started as a purely natural and economic movement has now acquired communal, political and international dimensions with serious security overtones. Although Bangladeshi migrants have come into several states of India; their number is alarming in the states of West Bengal, Assam and Tripura. Also they are slowly but surely creeping into Mizoram as cheap labour force. It is high time Mizoram learns a lesson from other sister states. If not effectively checked, they may swamp the sons of the soil and this may also help the fissiparous forces in facilitating severing the NE landmass from the rest of India. This will lead to disastrous strategic and economic results. Politicians for their own vested interests are under playing this issue of grave importance to national security. Lt Gen (Retd) SK Sinha, PVSM , erstwhile Governor of Assam in his report to the Central Govt suggested some steps, which can be taken in this regard, these are: - Awareness should be promoted about illegal migration. It is not only a threat to the identity of the people of NE but a grave threat to our national security. Border fencing should be completed on a war footing. Observation towers and lights should be provided on the same scale as in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir i.e., Northern and Western Border. BSF battalions deployed should be given responsibility to hold frontages which they can effectively dominate. The time tested modus operandi being followed in Punjab, BSF battalions should hold a frontage of 25 to 30 kilometres in plains and on eastern borders of Bangladesh it may be 10 to 15 kilometres only. Thus need for additional BSF battalions. Diversion of BSF battalions from the border for other task, when the battle against infiltrators is on, must be avoided. All country boats, plying in the river near the border should be registered and their registration numbers marked on them. Provisioning of multi-purpose photo identity cards should be speeded up to all our nationals. Districts bordering Bangladesh should be accorded higher priority. The National Register of Citizens should be updated and computerised. A separate register of Stateless citizens should also be maintained. As far as possible, we should assist in the process of economic development in Bangladesh. Have joint ventures to increase the stakes of each country. Hindu illegal migrants who have infiltrated after 24 March, 1971 should not be given refugee status. They should be treated as illegal migrants. Survey teams working under Magistrates, be nominated to identify the illegal migrants within a fixed time- frame. IMDT Act. The Illegal Migrants Detection Tribunal (IMDT) Act of 1983 was struck down by the Supreme Court in July 2005 following a public interest litigation by Sarmanand Sonawal, AGP MP from Dibrugarh. The IMDT Act of 1983 was applicable only to Assam. A foreigner in Assam is to be dealt with under this act, while in rest of the country they are dealt with under Foreigners Act – 1946. Since 1983, till 2006 the Assam Govt had been able to identify approximately 12000 illegal migrants and of these it has been able to deport only 1700. No country in the world had two sets of laws like this. Obviously, this discrimination against the state of Assam was to appease the minorities. The govt sought to bypass the Supreme Court judgement by bringing amendments to Foreigners Act (1946) by Foreigners (Tribunals) Amendment Order. For political reasons this too was struck down by the apex court in 2006. The drawbacks of the IMDT act are:- Onus of proof to establish citizenship lies with the state of Assam under IMDT Act, while it lies with the individual in case of other states. Police does not have powers to detain, arrest or search a suspect thus making it convenient for the suspected migrant to melt away. They can abscond during the screening period or 30 days period allowed for appeal before the Appellant Tribunal. Unlike other criminal cases, witnesses appearing before the tribunal are not paid any travel expenses. So witnesses refuse to oblige the Govt. The complainants are required to pay a monetary fee to complain against a suspected illegal migrant. Roughly Rs 750 crores have been spent on implementations with hardly any worthwhile results.
Posted on: Tue, 06 May 2014 07:26:28 +0000
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