The six-year-long Assam Movement came to an end with the historic Assam Accord signed between the representatives of All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and the Union Government on 15 August 1985. The Assam Accord contains some important clauses related to various problems in Assam; most important is the illegal foreigners posing a serious threat to the socio-economic and cultural condition in the state. The Assam Accord seeks to detect and deport all foreigners belonging to any religion who have entered the state after 15 March 1971, the date of birth of Bangladesh. All people in the state lent support to it and demanded its immediate implementation for the betterment and well-being of the state.
The Union Government passed the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) in 2019, granting citizenship to illegal Hindu, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain and Parsi foreigners who had entered India till 31 May 2014 from its six neighboring countries. Recently the Union Government has implemented the CAA in India, including Assam, to grant citizenship to those people in India. And it has certainly invalidated the Assam Accord seeking to expel all kinds of post-1971 foreigners from Assam. It does not behove of a secular country like India. A question arises: “Will the Assam Accord now be applied only to post-1971 Muslim foreigners illegally living in Assam?”
Muhammad Abdus Samad
Dhupdhara, Assam
Questions over EC Resignation
There is no doubt something mysterious about the resignation of Arun Goel from the post of Election Commissioner, just weeks before the much-awaited Lok Sabha elections in the country. The commission is the prime body entrusted with the responsibility of holding the elections and there should be no doubts about its performance which would give the Opposition an issue to criticise it. One hopes that the vacancies in the poll body now filled are effectively equipped to conduct the coming elections in a fair and transparent manner.
Fahim Ahmed,
Bengaluru, Karnataka
US is on ‘theatrical’ mission
Last week the US dropped food ‘aid’ from the sky, with parachutes seen from far and wide, so that the camera could catch the overwhelming gratitude of the ‘Imperial force’.
After providing tons and tons of ammunition to its illegitimate child, Israel, to bomb Palestinians, now was the time to fool the world that they are so concerned with the starving Gazans!
Food for 11 thousand dropped, where the population is 2.3 million.
Furthermore, they are taking ‘great pains’ in constructing a ‘pier’ in the Mediterranean sea, on the coast of Gaza, so that humanitarian aid could be reached via Cyprus, by sea.
If they are so concerned with the crises of Gazans, why not call for a ceasefire, which they vetoed 3 times in the UNSC and lift the cease along the Rafah border? Thousands of trucks are stranded on the Egyptian side, full of aid but not allowed into Gaza.
Before 7th Oct, 500 trucks used to enter from Rafah crossing daily. And now in this dire circumstances, one thousand trucks of Humanitarian trucks are required to sustain the suffering of the people.
But US is on ‘theatrical’ mission. And why not? They are champions in making Hollywood movies, therefore the airdrops is more for the camera than to assist the starving people. (One parachute malfunction crushed 5 Palestinians to death.)
But they are managing to fool only a few. The world has awakened to see their hypocrisy in and out.
Nazir Ahmed
Mumbai