GUWAHATI — The North East Students’ Organisation (NESO) on Monday observed the ‘black day’ across the region against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act {CAA}.
December 11 marked the fourth anniversary of the passage of the CAA in the Parliament.
The student body, which is a conglomerate of eight student organisations of seven northeastern states including the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), displayed black flags and banners while staging protests in the capital cities of northeastern states. It demanded scrapping the contentious law.
NESO and few other organisations have been spearheading the agitations across the region since the BJP-led Central government passed the CAA in the Parliament in 2019.
“We have observed ‘black day’ all over northeast to tell the Central government that we are against the CAA that was passed in the Parliament on December 11, 2019 despite widespread protests,” NESO Chairman Samuel B. Jyrwa told IANS.
In Assam, which was the epicentre of the anti-CAA protests in 2019, the AASU with black flags held a protest demonstration at Swahid Bhawan in Guwahati.
NESO constituent Twipra Student Federation (TSF) advisor Upendra Debbarma said: “The observance of ‘black day’ is to give a message to the government of India that we are vehemently against the CAA and also at the same time to remind our people of yet another political injustice that the government perpetrated on the indigenous peoples of the northeast.”
Debbarma, former President of TSF, demanded repealing CAA from the northeast.
The anti-CAA protests had first started in Assam, parts of West Bengal and other northeastern states in 2019 and continued till 2020 before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
At least five persons were killed in the protests against the CAA in Assam, which also witnessed large-scale violence and imposition of curfew for several days.
The CAA seeks to grant Indian citizenship to non-Muslim minorities — Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians — who have migrated from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan till December 31, 2014, after facing faith-based persecution.
It was passed by both the Houses of Parliament and given Presidential assent in December 2019.
However, rules under the CAA are yet to be framed.
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