‘D’ Category and Lost Years
The day that the ‘foreigners’ issue caused turmoil in the Assam Assembly and made headlines, once again – as it has for over 30 years, without much being resolved one way or the other – a few revealing statistics also were reported. I reflect on them here because they raise troubling issues. These are questions and concerns not about existing facts but missing data.
We are always emotionally charged, and rightly so, and deeply exercised about the ‘illegal migration’ issue, even though facts and figures show that the real numbers are less than has been proclaimed from the rooftops. That there has been substantial illegal migration over several decades is not in dispute. In question is the declaration – unsubstantiated for the main, but for emotional declarations, sweeping rhetoric and passionate columns by parties, organizations and individuals– that the influx is continuing at an extensive and alarming pace. While migration may indeed be taking place, the issue is about the numbers as much as anything else and the reality that the issue is as far from a solution as it was some years back.
One does not wish to go into the details of the rhetoric. What is important is also to look at the facts, in this case, as the State Government has placed in a press conference while the State Assembly session was going on. The ’D’ or Doubtful category of voters was the issue that State Forest Minister Rockybul Hussain, a close aide to the Chief Minister and a spokesman for the government, addressed.
According to news reports, this is what Mr. Hussain had to state on 15 July 2013: that 91,159 out of a total of 2,31,657 cases of ‘Doubtful’ Voters i.e. possibly foreign nationals had been ‘disposed’ of through due process. Of the 91,159, only 7,152 were identified as ‘illegal foreigners’ while 41,190 were found to be Indian citizens.
I find this very puzzling. The figures don’t add up or maybe the reporters did not get the full picture. If 91,159 cases had been resolved, and of this only 7,152 were foreigners and 41,190 were Indians, then what were the others? There are 42,997 more persons who have not been categorized, at least not in the reports which I have seen. So where does it place them – for surely they cannot be denizens of another planet? Are they still ‘D’ people and hence in suspended animation, without the rights of a citizen? But if the issue has been resolved in their case, why doesn’t the government categorically say what their status is?
In the Assembly, Mr. Hussain said that 1,18,472 persons had been served D notices between January 2003 and January 2013. But he did not say or at least was not quoted as saying or clarifying over what period did the 2,31,657 cases come from? Surely, they would go back further in time. So, as usual in the issue of ‘illegal migration’ and ‘foreigners’, the figures provided by the government don’t add up or fall short of what is regarded as the ‘real’ figures.
There is no agreement on the number of ‘foreigners’ in Assam or the North-east. Each political party cites a figure that it finds useful. But there are those who deeply believe in the ‘cause’ of fighting for the indigenous, those of the land and the people, what dictionaries define as “either originating in and characteristic of a particular region or country; native (often followed by to): the plants indigenous to Canada; the indigenous peoples of southern Africa” or “innate; inherent; natural (usually followed by to): feelings indigenous to human beings.”
Of course, this issue has a long, painful and bitter – even bloody — history In the region, especially in Assam. The acute contestation of even the definition of what constitutes an ‘immigrant’ or ‘illegal immigrant’ or ‘foreigner’ shows how complex and sensitive the question remains. The Election Commission of India under the then Chief Election Commissioner MS Gill devised the ‘D’ category in 1998 to focus on people who were seen as being of ‘doubtful’ citizenship or origin i.e. individuals whose ‘Indian-ness’ was open to challenge and hence should not be allowed to vote till the cloud over their citizenship was resolved and they had produced enough documentation and proof to substantiate their assertion of citizenship.
In 2011 December, the chief minister opposed the category clearly and said that “Our responsibility is to protect genuine Indian citizens and no government has carried out this responsibility better than us. The Election Commission classifies ‘D’ voters and we know majority of them turn out to be genuine Indian citizens. Their classification has been wrongly done and I have told this to chief election commissioner (SY Quraishi) at a meeting here. But the EC is an autonomous body and is not bound to listen to us.”
He was referring to the process which had begun over a decade back and which, after an intensive house to house survey, turned up as many as 370,000 persons as people of Doubtful Identity if they could not produce documents to back up their claim of Indian citizenship. After being barred from voting, the High Court sent off a large number to detention camps. Another revision, showed that many of those who were categorized were missing and the figure was revised to 181,619.
The issue became extremely sensitive after two rickshaw pullers, both Bengali speaking Hindus and brothers, were declared to be Bangladeshis though they had been voting regularly and pushed into Bangladesh by the Border Security Force.
Such cases raise issues that are not even addressed in all the rhetoric that flows about in this political space. These are uncomfortable questions but they need to be faced. For instance, what happens in and to the lives of those who have been characterized as ‘foreigners’ and ‘illegal migrants’ but have been set free of that stigma by courts and tribunals? How do they recoup, refigure and reshape their lives and that of their families? What is the role of Government and other processes to help in that process?
There are two sub- issues which need to be considered by the government and political parties, by other communities in Assam with regard to this larger question:
The first is whether such groups and individuals, people who have suffered physical and mental harm and harassment, loss of income and livelihoods, of jobs and dignity, are entitled to some form of compensation for the years lost and the time and energy dissipated.
The second is whether, as in other parts of the North-east, many of these could be characterized as victims of discrimination and need the help of trained counselors to come out of conditions of stress. All citizens have equal rights to health care that can help them recover from trauma.
In the cases under discussion here, they may not be directly suffering from Post Trauma Stress Syndrome (PTSS) induced by victimization at the hands of security forces as well as members of militant/armed groups as seen elsewhere among different communities and several states of the NER. After all, it is an established clinical finding that those who have suffered extensively in conflict zones in the world need psychiatric care and counseling by caregivers. But discrimination and a sense of alienation can also be contributory factors to PTSS.
After all, no one can bring the lost years back.
By the Brahmaputra
By Sanjoy Hazarika
http://www.assamtribune.com/