Guwahati: Pravajan Virodhi Mancha (PVM) on Monday submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the chairman and members of the National Commission on Demographic Change (NCDC), and BJP national general secretary (organisation), seeking their intervention in the Assam Land Revenue Regulation Amendment, 2026.
PVM convenor and Supreme Court senior advocate Upamanyu Hazarika, in the representation, drew attention to what he described as the implications of the amended definition of ‘original inhabitant’.
Hazarika said the definition has serious implications as it clubs indigenous persons with those of Bangladesh/East Bengal origin into one category.
He said the definition requires an ‘original inhabitant’ to have three generations living continuously in the area, with one generation taken as 25 years of continuous residence.
According to Hazarika, under this definition, a family comprising three generations could migrate from Bangladesh in 1979 and qualify as an ‘original inhabitant’ by January 1, 2006, as each generation would have completed 25 years of continuous residence in Assam.
He further said the provision could mean that three generations of a family migrating from Bangladesh before 1980 could become ‘original inhabitants’, effectively shifting the cut-off date for granting citizenship to migrants from Bangladesh from 1971 to 1979.
Hazarika also raised concerns over the implications for the NRC process. He pointed out that the only other statute where ‘original inhabitant’ is mentioned is the rules under the Citizenship Act providing for the NRC process, where the category is subject to a liberal verification procedure for inclusion in the NRC.
In 2021, investigations by the district authorities of Nagaon and Kamrup found that a significant number of persons of Bangladeshi origin had been marked as ‘original inhabitants’ and included in the NRC despite not having proper documentation, Hazarika said.
The representation further stated that the definition adopted in the Land Revenue Regulation Amendment would enable those of Bangladeshi origin to be included in the NRC.
It cited an estimate by the State Coordinator of NRC in Assam in a report dated May 8, 2021, that 25 lakh persons had been included in the NRC with inadequate documents.
The PVM also raised the issue of encroachment on Satra land. According to state government data cited in the representation, 15,288 bighas (5,000 acres) of Satra land are under encroachment.
The representation said the situation existed during the tenure of the previous Congress government and clearing such encroachment was one of the primary promises of the BJP. It added that despite the BJP winning three assembly elections, the situation remained unchanged, with only some minor encroachment having been cleared.
Hazarika said the Assam government could invoke the provisions of the Assam Land Grabbing Act, 2010, under which land grabbing is an offence punishable with imprisonment of up to five years.
Instead, he said, legislation had been passed providing protections to encroachers.
The representation said that if there was sincerity in protecting Satra land, the definition of ‘original inhabitant’ should be revised to a cut-off date of 1901, before the arrival of migrants from East Bengal, whom it described as the primary encroachers on Satra land.