GUWAHATI: The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) has voiced strong concerns over the citizenship amendment act (CAA), asserting that its implementation will adversely affect the demography, economy, culture, employment, society, land and other resources in the Northeast.
Tripura CPI-M state secretary Jitendra Chaudhury criticized the central government’s assurances that the CAA would not apply to tribal autonomous district council (ADC) areas, labelling such declarations as insignificant.
“When the CAA is implemented in a state, its negative effects are bound to create problems in demography, economy, culture, employment, society, land, and all other resources, both in ADC areas and non-ADC areas,” Chaudhury, also the opposition leader in Tripura, stated.
The CPI-M, from the outset, has opposed the CAA and has once again urged the central government to refrain from introducing the law in the Northeast.
The region houses ten ADCs across four states, with Assam, Mizoram and Meghalaya having three each, and Tripura having one such tribal autonomous body.
Chaudhury, a former minister and CPI-M central committee member, accused the central government of hastily framing the rules for the CAA in March to gain electoral advantage in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections, after a period of inactivity on the issue.
The anti-CAA protests, which erupted in Assam, parts of West Bengal, and other Northeast states in 2019, continued until 2020 before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
These protests resulted in the deaths of at least five individuals in Assam and one in Tripura.
On March 11, the Centre notified the citizenship amendment rules 2024, paving the way for enforcing the CAA.
This law seeks to grant Indian citizenship to persecuted Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis, and Christians who entered India from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan before December 31, 2014.