Guwahati: In a move that has been drawing a lot of attention, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has clarified that the Assam government has not issued any special directive to drop cases of non-Muslim illegal foreigners from the Foreigners Tribunals (FTs), reiterating that the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) already offers them legal protection.
Speaking to the press after a cabinet meeting in Guwahati, the Chief Minister stated that no special cabinet decision has been taken on the matter. “The state government has not issued any direction, except what has been already there in the CAA,” he said. He further explained that the CAA itself provides security and protection to individuals who entered India on or before December 31, 2014, and unless the Supreme Court strikes it down, it remains the law of the land, thus rendering a special decision unnecessary.
The Chief Minister did, however, mention that the state cabinet had previously taken two distinct decisions to drop cases from the FTs concerning the Koch-Rajbongshi and Gorkha communities.
This clarification comes in the wake of a directive accessed by PTI, signed by Additional Chief Secretary (Home and Political) Ajay Tewari on July 22, which instructed District Commissioners and Senior Superintendents of Police to review the status of foreigners from countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar. The directive also encouraged these individuals to apply for Indian citizenship under the CAA. It is to be noted that last year in July, the Assam government had already advised its Border Police wing not to forward cases of non-Muslim illegal immigrants who entered before 2015 to the Foreigners Tribunals, instead telling them to apply for citizenship under the new law.
The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, provides a path to Indian citizenship for Hindus, Jains, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who entered India on or before December 31, 2014, after living here for five years. According to legal provisions, only the FTs have the authority to declare a person a foreigner in Assam.
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