The infamous myth of “illegal Bangladeshi migrants” have already been debunked by many acclaimed Indian scholars. But given the recent hysteria and propaganda I wanted to open another thread on it based on articles and stats mostly from Indian sources written by non-muslim Indian authors/journalist :
Muslims first arrived in Assam in 1206from Bengal under the legendary figure Muhammad-Bin-Bakhtiar Khilji, the General of Muhammad Ghouri crossing the river Manas. Muhammad Bakhtiar Khilji made an unsuccessful assault on territory of Assam in the year 1206 A.D. This was followed by many more muslim military expedition by the likes of Ghys Uddin, a Governor of Bengal, Iktyar Uddin Yusbek Tughril Khan and Mohammad Shah in 1337 A.D. Mohammad shah for eg. established a small kingdom in and around Hajo. His later Commander-in Chief Izaz Khan went upto Nagaon. Thereafter the descendants of Bakhtiar Khilji which includes Sultan Gias Uddin Aulia ruled at Kamrup the then Assam. The graveyard of Sultan Gias Uddin Aulia still exists at Hajo with some of his contemporary rulers and generals.
During their rule (kingdom) they assimilated with local people, married here which resulted in growth of Muslim population in Assam. Thus The Muslims are the second original inhabitant of Assam next to Bodo, Kachari, Chutia, Dimasa etc. because of the fact that the Ahoms (Assamese people) came to Assam in 13th century in and about the year 1228 A.D. from upper Burma crossing the Patkai Hill Ranges. They are of Mangoloid origin being a member of Shan sub-section of the Indo-Chinese family people. They embraced Hindu religion only in the 17th century when the Brahmins and other priestly classes of Hindus from different parts of India particularly Bengal, Orissa and Kanauj started flocking into Assam.
Hussain Shah, the Sultan of Bengal conquered kamata State or western Assam in1448 A.D. and continued his ruling (administration) till 1519. Mirjumla, the General of Aurangazeb, invaded Assam in 1662. Later on, a treaty was signed in between Ahoms and Mughals on 1st January, 1663 by Ahom king Jaioddhaj Singha and he surrendered a vast territory to Mughals like west of the river Barnadi on the north bank of Brahmaputra and West Kalang river on the southern bank. Ahom king Gadadhar Singha later on in 1682 could regain some portions of that land but the then Goalpara district remained under the control of Mughals with rest of Bengal till 1765, when it was brought under the control of East India Company. Not all the Muslims came from outside. A huge number of local people embraced Islam on their own accord just like in rest of India.
( From an article by Mustafa Khaddam Hussain posted by @asad71 Myth of BD Infiltrators in Assam
● The reason for Assam and NE as a whole for having a large chunk of muslims population Is also because of migration during British raj in the late 1820s rather than fictious myth of “illegal immigration” from BD. The muslim peasants of East Bengal were influenced, pressurized and patronized by the British to migrate to Assam as the land was abundant & underpopulated and the brits needed cheap labour to cultivate the land. The influx was mainly into the bramaputra valley and under state sponsorship it reached staggering proportions by 1920/1930s.
● Due this alarming level of influx and pressure from the locol bodo leaders the british introduced “line system” restricting immigrants from settling beyond certain limits on land over which natives claimed rights. Over time the quality of land the muslims found to settle themselves on, became progressively degraded. Many were left to settle on marshy wastelands and the shifting sandbars of the Brahmaputra called chars or chaporis in the vast floodplains of the valley. This is where a substantial percentage of their descendents still live after nearly a century. At the mercy of annual floods, shifting of the chars regularly and incessant erosion of their lands by the Brahmaputra and its tributaries, a large percentage of the Muslim population of immigrant origin in these districts is rendered homeless regularly. To eke out a living, they often migrate to the towns and cities as construction labourers, vegetable vendors or rickshaw pullers, living in ghettoized shanty towns, raising the spectre of illegal Bangladeshis in minds of a hostile urban elite with little sympathy or insight into realities of life about the areas they have migrated from.
● The erstwhile Goalpara district was a part of undivided Bengal. This Goalpara district (now divided into 4 districts) forms a part of present day Assam. Hence, relative presence of Bengali speaking people in this part of Assam can be traced much before the entry of Biritish. Infact The state of Assam came into existence in the year 1874 again in 1912. This present day territorial Assam, as we know it today was not in existence in pre-British period.
● The goalpara today is divided into Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon, Dhubri, and Goalpara district and out of this only goalpara and Dhubri still remain muslim majority with 53 & 74% pop. respectively. (Muslim Population by District in Assam - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
So far the numbers of these ghostly illegals keeps on fluctuating as it seems that hindtuva hindus are yet to decide how many Indian muslims they want to kick out:
● As per Former CPI director Indrajit Gupta in 1997 the number was 10mn, while one of India’s most power leader BJP’s LK advani discovered that this figure doubled at 20 mn in 2003.
● According to the former governor of Assam Lt Gen (Retd) Ajay Singh, 6000 super human BDs fly over the barbed wire fence dodging BSF bullets to enter into Assam everyday which makes it 20.1 lacs superhuman BD mutants every year.
● According to BJP’s Arun Jaitley 60-80 per cent of the population in both Dhubri and Goalpara districts are foreigners, foreigners whose forefathers speak fluent assamese.
● Former MoS for Home Affairs Sri Prakash Jaiswal said in the floor of the Parliament that there are 50 lac illegal immigrants in Assam where as the total Assam pop. was 82 lac in 2001. In short this guy showed his clear intent to ethnic cleaning of an entire community.
● At the peak of Assam agitation some spoke of two crore illegal immigrants in North East. Almost twenty years later the entire population of North-East, according to 2001 census is 40 million i.e. 4 crores.
The current perception of Indian pop. have been shaped by these constant baseless rants of their leaders backed by a powerful anti-muslim dominating media narrative demonizing India’s Bengali muslims. With a pshyche inclined to hating muslims and a education system that fails to entail the knowledge of basic mathematics, its relatively easy to fool such a pop. into believing absolute nonsense. One wonders whether supporters of “illegal BD immigrant theory” even know how to count when they come up with such numbers while repeating their propaganda.
Table in the link- The Myth of the Bangladeshi and Violence in Assam: Nilim Dutta | Kafila
Note- Decadal growth rate of Indian muslims throughout India during 1991-2001 was 29.5 % far higher than that of Dhubri or Assam. Are muslims of other Indian states illegals too?
(http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCEQFjAA&url=http://cpsindia.org/dl/religious/ppt-eng.pdf&ei=mMWOU5nQKc3j8AXkiIKoDQ&usg=AFQjCNG4UO4oXCdPG02kKFOC0p8sk-UsvA)
● Population growth rate in Assam has declined since 1971 and has remained lower than that of India (Table 1), categorically refuting assumptions of continuing illegal immigration from Bangladesh. As per Assam Accord of 1985 (agreed upon by Bodo nationalist, AGP) only those who have entered Assam later than 25 March 1971 are considered illegal immigrants and it’s a widely acknowledged fact that supported by official pop. cencus that most influx happened before 71 that has continued since the 1820s.
● The census figures clearly point out that after 1971; there is no major increase in the population of the area. The decadal growth in India, Assam, Dhubri, Dhemaji, and Karbi Anglong from 1971 to 1991 had been 54.51, 54.26, 45.65, 107.50, and 74.72 respectively. While the same in the decade of 1991-01 became 21.54, 18.92, 22.97, 19.45, 22.72 and in the decade of 01-11 it became 17.64, 16.93, 24.40, 20.30 and 18.69 respectively. Among the districs mentioned, only Dhubri is muslim majority.
● That eye-popping often Hindutva cited propaganda of 45.65 % growth in Dhubri that has many people up in arms is really over TWO decades since Assam had no census in 1981. Over those two decades India’s growth rate was 54.41%
● Lets look at the non-muslim majority districts of Dhemaji and Karbi Anglong where the pop. growth post-71 has been substantially higher than Assam. Yet the muslim pop. of these 2 districts have been miniscule and even decreasing. Is this also due to “illegal influx” from BD? Are this Hindu bodos “immigrating” from BD?
● Muslims in India along with lower caste and secluded tribes have higher pop. growth rate than socially/economically well off majority Hindus. Poverty and illiteracy is one major cause. For eg. the growth rate during 1971-1991 in India among different groups is as follows: Hindus (52.24), Muslims (71.47), SC (72.78), and ST (78.24), while for Assam it is: Hindus (41.89), Muslims (77.42), SC (81.84) and ST (78.91). This clearly shows that the growth rate among Muslims is much higher that of the growth rate of Hindus as a whole. But when separately examined, the growth rate of SC and ST (within Hindus), it is seen that their growth rates are still higher than that of Muslims. This trend exists almost everywhere in India. (Illegal immigration in Assam: Myth or reality?)
●Growth of low caste Hindus and tribes in India and assam has been more than their muslim counterparts. Can this too be attributed to gostl “illegals” from BD?
Muslim gr rate % from 71-91- India (71.47) , Assam (77.42)
Hindu SC/ST gr rate % from 71-91 - India ( 72.78) , Assam (81.84
(Illegal immigration in Assam: Myth or reality?)
● Furthermore, against Assam having just three districts bordering Bangladesh, Meghalaya has five, which have shown higher decadal growth rates of population than the districts of Assam yet have an insignificant Muslim population negating any suspicion that they could have been swamped by illegal Bangladeshis. This also debunks the myth that district bordering BD is vulnerable to “illegal immigrants” .
● The recent slaughter of 32 muslims in Kokrajhar by Bodo militants have been attributed as a illegal migrants issue by Hindutva nationalist. The illegal immigrant theory-wallahs claim that Kokrajhar has seen its Muslim population go up by leaps and bounds. But in an op-ed in The Hindu, Banajit Hussain says in fact, in 1971 the Muslim population of Kokrajhar was 17 percent. It hit 20.4 percent in 2001. Kokrajhar’s decadal rate of growth has actually declined from 14.49 percent between 1991-2001 to 5.19 percent. So what happened? It’s obviously not a sudden spike in death rates says Hussain.
The other possibility, which seems more plausible, is that there has been a considerable out-migration from Kokrajhar, especially after the formation of the BTAD in 2003. BTAD (bodo territorial administrative districticts r areas where Bodos are given a monopoly over local politics. Why would bodos leave a area over which they again autonomy. In all probability, the out-migration involves other non-Bodo communities, including Muslims.
The Myth of the Bangladeshi and Violence in Assam: Nilim Dutta | Kafila
The illegal Bangladeshi immigrant: Do the bogeyman numbers add up? | Firstpost
Riots & the bogey of Bangladeshis - The Hindu
● In the last three Censuses (1991, 2001 and 2011), decadal growth rates of population have been lower than the national figure.
● Population in Dhemaji district grew dramatically by 74.72 per cent between 1971 and 1991. But 95 per cent of the population happen to be Hindus.
Why should a sudden spike in pop. growth rate be attributed to “illegal muslim immigrants”?
●Tripura has a 900-km border with Bangladesh (as compared to 270 kms for Assam) and yet illegal migrants do not seem to be an issue there
●In absolute terms, the number of people in the state went up by 4.51 million in a decade (45,13,744 to be precise) in the 2011 census (provisional). The population of children below the age of 6, born after the last census in 2001, is also 4.51 million (45,11,307). The fear of run-away illegal migration, therefore, may well be misplaced.
● 80 per cent of the over 4,000 km-long border is now double-fenced with barbed wire and flood-lit. Hundreds of border posts manned by armed Border Security Force personnel *** the landscape, with the Indian government resolving to reduce the gap between these posts from the current 3.5 km to 2.5 km. Riverine policing with speed boats and flood lights has also been introduced.
Census Figures Nix Illegal Migration Theory | Uttam Sengupta
At the time of Partition, a substantial Bengali Muslim immigrant population chose to stay back in Assam as Indian citizens. Over successive generations, having been educated in Assamese-medium schools, most have genuinely adopted Assamese as their language and this is reflected in the census data. For instance, Dhubri with a Muslim population of 74.29% has 70.07% Assamese speakers. This is in stark contrast to the Barak valley districts like Karimganj and Hailakandi where Bengali has remained the predominant linguistic identity among both Hindus and Muslims. As per 1931 census, the percentage Assamese speaking people was 36%. However, it shoot out abnormally to 62% in 1971 as the vast section of immigrant Muslims though their original mother tongue was Bengali, recorded Assamese as their mother tongue in the census.
The Myth of the Bangladeshi and Violence in Assam: Nilim Dutta | Kafila
Elections were held in Assam along with rest of India in 1951, 1957, 1962, 1971 and 1977-1978. There were many Election petitions in the High Court and even in Supreme Court. Nobody has ever raised the question that there were foreigners in Assam or in voter lists. During the period from 1962 to 1970, the police personnel entered into the minority dominated villages at dark night and picked up and genuine Indian citizens as being Pakistani (now called Bangladeshi) without giving any opportunity of defending themselves. Hiralal Patowary, MP from Mangodoi died in 1978 and a rumor spread that Mrs. Indira Gandhi would contest from Mangaldoi. Overnights a cry for the first time in the history of Assam was raised that there were lakhs and lakhs of foreigners in Assam and in the voter list. Due to death of Hiralal Patowary bye-election was held in April 1979 in Mangaldoi. In the Bye-Election revised electoral Roll was prepared after deleting names of thousands of voters as alleged as foreigners. This is the beginning of Assam agitation. Rest is till today only politics.
The Assam agitation was led by the All Assam Students Union (AASU) and All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad (AAGSP). Initially the agitation was against the outsiders (Bohiragata Kheda), and later on it became anti foreigners (Bidehi kheda) and finally anti Bangladeshi (Bangladeshi kheda). The agitation was guided by the chauvinist forces.
Its important to note here that much before ‘illegal Bangladeshi immigrants’ were conjured up as the diabolic ‘other’ conspiring to ‘overwhelm the natives’, it was the Bengali Hindu immigrants in Assam who faced the hostility of the native Assamese. The conflict wasn’t over land but the perception, real or imagined, that the Bengali Hindu middle class conspired to retain their hegemony over the native Assamese by keeping the nascent Assamese middle class deprived of the opportunities in government jobs and economic benefits that would have otherwise been the entitlements of natives. The worst spate of Bengali-Assamese violence erupted in 1960 and regardless of whatever rhetoric it may have been couched in, it was a result of mobilisation around a narrative constructed by the Assamese middle class. Thus making a bogeymen out of muslims had considerable political benefits of many quarters not to mention the Assam insurgency was at its peak back at those times.
The agitation resulted in deaths of 1000s of muslims, arsoning, murder and destruction of muslim villages that continued unabated till 1985. Nille massacre for eg. Took the lives of 5-10K muslims. According to famous journalist namely Mr. Shankar Gupta, the Brahmaputra Valley was turned into a valley of death and smell of blood reminded visitors of the brutal atrocities let loose on the innocent minorities in Assam. The mass murder in the entire Brahmaputra Valley was literally a holocaust. After visiting the affected areas of Assam, after Nellie massacre, Mr. Shankar Gupta of the “Indian Express” wrote: “There is no life around, save for the hungry flocks of vultures………human skeletons totally devoid of flesh.” (New Delhi 14.03.1983). Mr. Gupta further said that “most people fear fresh attacks as soon as they return. Near Khoirabari, I have overheard a group of youth light heartedly tell Jawans of Border Security Force (BSF), we will not be here forever. We have only done half of the job by sending the foreigners to camps. The other half remains to be done.”
In 1983 ILLEGAL MIGRANTS (DETERMINATION BY TRIBUNAL) ACT, 1983 was enacted and it was meant for all of India but first enforced only in Assam to deal with the mythical “illegal immigrant” issue raised by vested political quarters. This act gave some sort of relief to the genuine Indian citizens and Assamese/Bengali muslims who were being harassed under the foreigners act 1940 , a british era colonial rule that gave law enforcement agencies unbridled powers to identify, detain & deport “foreigners”. Under the foreigners act the onus of proving someone’s Indian citizenship is on the accused & not on the authorities which is an impossible burden to discharge for most people in the country, who had no birth certificates and no land holdings. The result was that most people were completely at the mercy of the police, who in many places were abusing their powers under the Act to extort money from poor and defenceless people. What IMDT Act did was it put the burden of providing proofs on the authorities. Afterall this is what it should be right? That someone is innocent until proven guilty on the basis of evidence provided by the accuser. But apparently India’s justuice system doesn’t work that way.
The government's statistics showed that in the 20 years of the operation of the IMDT Act, about 80% of the complaints were rejected by the screening committee itself . Out of the remaining 76,228 cases referred to the Tribunals during these years, only 21,169 were disposed off by the Tribunal till 2003. Out of these, 11,636 persons were declared as illegal migrants, but only 1517 could be physically expelled.
An Unconscionable Judgement | Prashant Bhushan
Any way the ASP (asam gono parishod) and BJP were always against this IMDT act since they found that the act was coming in their way to ousting Bengali muslims from Assam. In 2000, a former president of the AASU, Sarbananda Sonowal, filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court seeking a declaration that the IMDT Act was unconstitutional. Thus in 2005 the IMDT act was struck down by Indian supreme court as unconstitutional & upheld the foreigners act to persecute minorities. The court dubbed the entire issue as a “aggression” against India and that the IMDT was coming in the way of expelling foreigners. After this , even a genuine Indian passport, ration card or voter ID card is not enough for a muslim to claim his Indian citizenry. Even children of prominent muslim families are now harassed as illegals. Examples include
●The family members of Syed Abdul Malik, Dr. Moidul Islam Bora and Arif Ali were charged as the Bangladeshis. Syed Abdul Malik was an Ex-Member of Parliament, former President of Asom Sahitya Sabha (Highest Literary body in Assam) and his forefathers were freedom fighters. Dr. Moidul Islam Bora was also happened to be former President of Asom Sahitya Sabha and his ancestors were the Ministers during Ahom rule in Assam. Mr. Arif Ali was the Chairman of Assam Public Service Commission. These insulting raids of Assam police came into limelight only because the affected people were the relatives of famous personalities. Countless similar cases of harassment and atrocities are done to hundreds of illiterate, unconscious, poor and downtrodden Muslims’ everyday but they are unnoticed. (Myth of BD Infiltrators in Assam
●Prakash Vihar is a jhuggi-jhopri colony in New Delhis Rohini area. The colony has about 200 poor Muslim families from West Bengal. Their only source of income is rag picking. Almost all of them have valid proofs of their being Indian citizen some possessing election IDs or ration cards from West Bengal while others have similar documents from Delhi. Yet they are vulnerable to khaki terror and are living at the mercy of the police. (Is every Bangla-speaking poor Muslim in India Bangladeshi migrant? | TwoCircles.net
●Hazrat Khan is living in the colony for seven years. He has election ID both from West Bengal and Delhi. Hailing from Birbhum district in West Bengal Khan earns from rag picking. Khan tells TwoCircles.net. “Though I have valid proofs of being Indian citizen police branded me a Bangladeshi and harasses me. “(Is every Bangla-speaking poor Muslim in India Bangladeshi migrant? | TwoCircles.net
Its well known that Indian politics is driven by anti-muslim communal hysteria and muslims r treated as second clss citizens whether its in NE or Bengal or J&K or UP. But trying to label and steoreotype what mostly are legitimate Indian citizens as “illegals” is something Indian Bengali muslims are the only ones facing. Muslims are taken advantage off by most Indian political parties with communal BJP/RSS openly drumming up anti-muslim hyteria. The congress party is also a Hindtuva party that throws muslims under the bus ones they r done using them for votes. On top of that muslims remain discriminated at all levels including education and jobs as a state policy and muslims are politically also disorganized , though I blame muslims for that. They should become politically more active in India to protect their rights enshrined in Intl human rights charter as well as whatever they can get from the current so called “secular” Indian constitution.
Its important to note here that the ones being targeted are the poorest of the poor most of who have become internally displaced refugees in their own country due to 3 decade of communal violence and natural disasters. The crisis brewing under the guise of rooting out migrants has serious ramification for the region as a whole.
Historical background of early muslim muslim migration into Assam
Muslims first arrived in Assam in 1206from Bengal under the legendary figure Muhammad-Bin-Bakhtiar Khilji, the General of Muhammad Ghouri crossing the river Manas. Muhammad Bakhtiar Khilji made an unsuccessful assault on territory of Assam in the year 1206 A.D. This was followed by many more muslim military expedition by the likes of Ghys Uddin, a Governor of Bengal, Iktyar Uddin Yusbek Tughril Khan and Mohammad Shah in 1337 A.D. Mohammad shah for eg. established a small kingdom in and around Hajo. His later Commander-in Chief Izaz Khan went upto Nagaon. Thereafter the descendants of Bakhtiar Khilji which includes Sultan Gias Uddin Aulia ruled at Kamrup the then Assam. The graveyard of Sultan Gias Uddin Aulia still exists at Hajo with some of his contemporary rulers and generals.
During their rule (kingdom) they assimilated with local people, married here which resulted in growth of Muslim population in Assam. Thus The Muslims are the second original inhabitant of Assam next to Bodo, Kachari, Chutia, Dimasa etc. because of the fact that the Ahoms (Assamese people) came to Assam in 13th century in and about the year 1228 A.D. from upper Burma crossing the Patkai Hill Ranges. They are of Mangoloid origin being a member of Shan sub-section of the Indo-Chinese family people. They embraced Hindu religion only in the 17th century when the Brahmins and other priestly classes of Hindus from different parts of India particularly Bengal, Orissa and Kanauj started flocking into Assam.
Hussain Shah, the Sultan of Bengal conquered kamata State or western Assam in1448 A.D. and continued his ruling (administration) till 1519. Mirjumla, the General of Aurangazeb, invaded Assam in 1662. Later on, a treaty was signed in between Ahoms and Mughals on 1st January, 1663 by Ahom king Jaioddhaj Singha and he surrendered a vast territory to Mughals like west of the river Barnadi on the north bank of Brahmaputra and West Kalang river on the southern bank. Ahom king Gadadhar Singha later on in 1682 could regain some portions of that land but the then Goalpara district remained under the control of Mughals with rest of Bengal till 1765, when it was brought under the control of East India Company. Not all the Muslims came from outside. A huge number of local people embraced Islam on their own accord just like in rest of India.
( From an article by Mustafa Khaddam Hussain posted by @asad71 Myth of BD Infiltrators in Assam
Bengalis and muslims have always been there in Assam:
● The reason for Assam and NE as a whole for having a large chunk of muslims population Is also because of migration during British raj in the late 1820s rather than fictious myth of “illegal immigration” from BD. The muslim peasants of East Bengal were influenced, pressurized and patronized by the British to migrate to Assam as the land was abundant & underpopulated and the brits needed cheap labour to cultivate the land. The influx was mainly into the bramaputra valley and under state sponsorship it reached staggering proportions by 1920/1930s.
● Due this alarming level of influx and pressure from the locol bodo leaders the british introduced “line system” restricting immigrants from settling beyond certain limits on land over which natives claimed rights. Over time the quality of land the muslims found to settle themselves on, became progressively degraded. Many were left to settle on marshy wastelands and the shifting sandbars of the Brahmaputra called chars or chaporis in the vast floodplains of the valley. This is where a substantial percentage of their descendents still live after nearly a century. At the mercy of annual floods, shifting of the chars regularly and incessant erosion of their lands by the Brahmaputra and its tributaries, a large percentage of the Muslim population of immigrant origin in these districts is rendered homeless regularly. To eke out a living, they often migrate to the towns and cities as construction labourers, vegetable vendors or rickshaw pullers, living in ghettoized shanty towns, raising the spectre of illegal Bangladeshis in minds of a hostile urban elite with little sympathy or insight into realities of life about the areas they have migrated from.
● The erstwhile Goalpara district was a part of undivided Bengal. This Goalpara district (now divided into 4 districts) forms a part of present day Assam. Hence, relative presence of Bengali speaking people in this part of Assam can be traced much before the entry of Biritish. Infact The state of Assam came into existence in the year 1874 again in 1912. This present day territorial Assam, as we know it today was not in existence in pre-British period.
● The goalpara today is divided into Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon, Dhubri, and Goalpara district and out of this only goalpara and Dhubri still remain muslim majority with 53 & 74% pop. respectively. (Muslim Population by District in Assam - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
Hindutva forces playing with numbers:
So far the numbers of these ghostly illegals keeps on fluctuating as it seems that hindtuva hindus are yet to decide how many Indian muslims they want to kick out:
● As per Former CPI director Indrajit Gupta in 1997 the number was 10mn, while one of India’s most power leader BJP’s LK advani discovered that this figure doubled at 20 mn in 2003.
● According to the former governor of Assam Lt Gen (Retd) Ajay Singh, 6000 super human BDs fly over the barbed wire fence dodging BSF bullets to enter into Assam everyday which makes it 20.1 lacs superhuman BD mutants every year.
● According to BJP’s Arun Jaitley 60-80 per cent of the population in both Dhubri and Goalpara districts are foreigners, foreigners whose forefathers speak fluent assamese.
● Former MoS for Home Affairs Sri Prakash Jaiswal said in the floor of the Parliament that there are 50 lac illegal immigrants in Assam where as the total Assam pop. was 82 lac in 2001. In short this guy showed his clear intent to ethnic cleaning of an entire community.
● At the peak of Assam agitation some spoke of two crore illegal immigrants in North East. Almost twenty years later the entire population of North-East, according to 2001 census is 40 million i.e. 4 crores.
The current perception of Indian pop. have been shaped by these constant baseless rants of their leaders backed by a powerful anti-muslim dominating media narrative demonizing India’s Bengali muslims. With a pshyche inclined to hating muslims and a education system that fails to entail the knowledge of basic mathematics, its relatively easy to fool such a pop. into believing absolute nonsense. One wonders whether supporters of “illegal BD immigrant theory” even know how to count when they come up with such numbers while repeating their propaganda.
Decadal pop. growth stats debunks this hindtuva myth:
Table in the link- The Myth of the Bangladeshi and Violence in Assam: Nilim Dutta | Kafila
Note- Decadal growth rate of Indian muslims throughout India during 1991-2001 was 29.5 % far higher than that of Dhubri or Assam. Are muslims of other Indian states illegals too?
(http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCEQFjAA&url=http://cpsindia.org/dl/religious/ppt-eng.pdf&ei=mMWOU5nQKc3j8AXkiIKoDQ&usg=AFQjCNG4UO4oXCdPG02kKFOC0p8sk-UsvA)
● Population growth rate in Assam has declined since 1971 and has remained lower than that of India (Table 1), categorically refuting assumptions of continuing illegal immigration from Bangladesh. As per Assam Accord of 1985 (agreed upon by Bodo nationalist, AGP) only those who have entered Assam later than 25 March 1971 are considered illegal immigrants and it’s a widely acknowledged fact that supported by official pop. cencus that most influx happened before 71 that has continued since the 1820s.
● The census figures clearly point out that after 1971; there is no major increase in the population of the area. The decadal growth in India, Assam, Dhubri, Dhemaji, and Karbi Anglong from 1971 to 1991 had been 54.51, 54.26, 45.65, 107.50, and 74.72 respectively. While the same in the decade of 1991-01 became 21.54, 18.92, 22.97, 19.45, 22.72 and in the decade of 01-11 it became 17.64, 16.93, 24.40, 20.30 and 18.69 respectively. Among the districs mentioned, only Dhubri is muslim majority.
● That eye-popping often Hindutva cited propaganda of 45.65 % growth in Dhubri that has many people up in arms is really over TWO decades since Assam had no census in 1981. Over those two decades India’s growth rate was 54.41%
● Lets look at the non-muslim majority districts of Dhemaji and Karbi Anglong where the pop. growth post-71 has been substantially higher than Assam. Yet the muslim pop. of these 2 districts have been miniscule and even decreasing. Is this also due to “illegal influx” from BD? Are this Hindu bodos “immigrating” from BD?
● Muslims in India along with lower caste and secluded tribes have higher pop. growth rate than socially/economically well off majority Hindus. Poverty and illiteracy is one major cause. For eg. the growth rate during 1971-1991 in India among different groups is as follows: Hindus (52.24), Muslims (71.47), SC (72.78), and ST (78.24), while for Assam it is: Hindus (41.89), Muslims (77.42), SC (81.84) and ST (78.91). This clearly shows that the growth rate among Muslims is much higher that of the growth rate of Hindus as a whole. But when separately examined, the growth rate of SC and ST (within Hindus), it is seen that their growth rates are still higher than that of Muslims. This trend exists almost everywhere in India. (Illegal immigration in Assam: Myth or reality?)
●Growth of low caste Hindus and tribes in India and assam has been more than their muslim counterparts. Can this too be attributed to gostl “illegals” from BD?
Muslim gr rate % from 71-91- India (71.47) , Assam (77.42)
Hindu SC/ST gr rate % from 71-91 - India ( 72.78) , Assam (81.84
(Illegal immigration in Assam: Myth or reality?)
● Furthermore, against Assam having just three districts bordering Bangladesh, Meghalaya has five, which have shown higher decadal growth rates of population than the districts of Assam yet have an insignificant Muslim population negating any suspicion that they could have been swamped by illegal Bangladeshis. This also debunks the myth that district bordering BD is vulnerable to “illegal immigrants” .
● The recent slaughter of 32 muslims in Kokrajhar by Bodo militants have been attributed as a illegal migrants issue by Hindutva nationalist. The illegal immigrant theory-wallahs claim that Kokrajhar has seen its Muslim population go up by leaps and bounds. But in an op-ed in The Hindu, Banajit Hussain says in fact, in 1971 the Muslim population of Kokrajhar was 17 percent. It hit 20.4 percent in 2001. Kokrajhar’s decadal rate of growth has actually declined from 14.49 percent between 1991-2001 to 5.19 percent. So what happened? It’s obviously not a sudden spike in death rates says Hussain.
The other possibility, which seems more plausible, is that there has been a considerable out-migration from Kokrajhar, especially after the formation of the BTAD in 2003. BTAD (bodo territorial administrative districticts r areas where Bodos are given a monopoly over local politics. Why would bodos leave a area over which they again autonomy. In all probability, the out-migration involves other non-Bodo communities, including Muslims.
The Myth of the Bangladeshi and Violence in Assam: Nilim Dutta | Kafila
The illegal Bangladeshi immigrant: Do the bogeyman numbers add up? | Firstpost
Riots & the bogey of Bangladeshis - The Hindu
No influx of Muslims in Assam over last decade
● In the last three Censuses (1991, 2001 and 2011), decadal growth rates of population have been lower than the national figure.
● Population in Dhemaji district grew dramatically by 74.72 per cent between 1971 and 1991. But 95 per cent of the population happen to be Hindus.
Why should a sudden spike in pop. growth rate be attributed to “illegal muslim immigrants”?
●Tripura has a 900-km border with Bangladesh (as compared to 270 kms for Assam) and yet illegal migrants do not seem to be an issue there
●In absolute terms, the number of people in the state went up by 4.51 million in a decade (45,13,744 to be precise) in the 2011 census (provisional). The population of children below the age of 6, born after the last census in 2001, is also 4.51 million (45,11,307). The fear of run-away illegal migration, therefore, may well be misplaced.
● 80 per cent of the over 4,000 km-long border is now double-fenced with barbed wire and flood-lit. Hundreds of border posts manned by armed Border Security Force personnel *** the landscape, with the Indian government resolving to reduce the gap between these posts from the current 3.5 km to 2.5 km. Riverine policing with speed boats and flood lights has also been introduced.
Census Figures Nix Illegal Migration Theory | Uttam Sengupta
Muslim settler’s determination for assimilation into Assam
At the time of Partition, a substantial Bengali Muslim immigrant population chose to stay back in Assam as Indian citizens. Over successive generations, having been educated in Assamese-medium schools, most have genuinely adopted Assamese as their language and this is reflected in the census data. For instance, Dhubri with a Muslim population of 74.29% has 70.07% Assamese speakers. This is in stark contrast to the Barak valley districts like Karimganj and Hailakandi where Bengali has remained the predominant linguistic identity among both Hindus and Muslims. As per 1931 census, the percentage Assamese speaking people was 36%. However, it shoot out abnormally to 62% in 1971 as the vast section of immigrant Muslims though their original mother tongue was Bengali, recorded Assamese as their mother tongue in the census.
The Myth of the Bangladeshi and Violence in Assam: Nilim Dutta | Kafila
Assam agitation (1979-1985) resulting in deaths of 1000s of muslims
Elections were held in Assam along with rest of India in 1951, 1957, 1962, 1971 and 1977-1978. There were many Election petitions in the High Court and even in Supreme Court. Nobody has ever raised the question that there were foreigners in Assam or in voter lists. During the period from 1962 to 1970, the police personnel entered into the minority dominated villages at dark night and picked up and genuine Indian citizens as being Pakistani (now called Bangladeshi) without giving any opportunity of defending themselves. Hiralal Patowary, MP from Mangodoi died in 1978 and a rumor spread that Mrs. Indira Gandhi would contest from Mangaldoi. Overnights a cry for the first time in the history of Assam was raised that there were lakhs and lakhs of foreigners in Assam and in the voter list. Due to death of Hiralal Patowary bye-election was held in April 1979 in Mangaldoi. In the Bye-Election revised electoral Roll was prepared after deleting names of thousands of voters as alleged as foreigners. This is the beginning of Assam agitation. Rest is till today only politics.
The Assam agitation was led by the All Assam Students Union (AASU) and All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad (AAGSP). Initially the agitation was against the outsiders (Bohiragata Kheda), and later on it became anti foreigners (Bidehi kheda) and finally anti Bangladeshi (Bangladeshi kheda). The agitation was guided by the chauvinist forces.
Its important to note here that much before ‘illegal Bangladeshi immigrants’ were conjured up as the diabolic ‘other’ conspiring to ‘overwhelm the natives’, it was the Bengali Hindu immigrants in Assam who faced the hostility of the native Assamese. The conflict wasn’t over land but the perception, real or imagined, that the Bengali Hindu middle class conspired to retain their hegemony over the native Assamese by keeping the nascent Assamese middle class deprived of the opportunities in government jobs and economic benefits that would have otherwise been the entitlements of natives. The worst spate of Bengali-Assamese violence erupted in 1960 and regardless of whatever rhetoric it may have been couched in, it was a result of mobilisation around a narrative constructed by the Assamese middle class. Thus making a bogeymen out of muslims had considerable political benefits of many quarters not to mention the Assam insurgency was at its peak back at those times.
The agitation resulted in deaths of 1000s of muslims, arsoning, murder and destruction of muslim villages that continued unabated till 1985. Nille massacre for eg. Took the lives of 5-10K muslims. According to famous journalist namely Mr. Shankar Gupta, the Brahmaputra Valley was turned into a valley of death and smell of blood reminded visitors of the brutal atrocities let loose on the innocent minorities in Assam. The mass murder in the entire Brahmaputra Valley was literally a holocaust. After visiting the affected areas of Assam, after Nellie massacre, Mr. Shankar Gupta of the “Indian Express” wrote: “There is no life around, save for the hungry flocks of vultures………human skeletons totally devoid of flesh.” (New Delhi 14.03.1983). Mr. Gupta further said that “most people fear fresh attacks as soon as they return. Near Khoirabari, I have overheard a group of youth light heartedly tell Jawans of Border Security Force (BSF), we will not be here forever. We have only done half of the job by sending the foreigners to camps. The other half remains to be done.”
A complacent judiciary aiding these state sponsored presecution of India’s muslim citizens:
In 1983 ILLEGAL MIGRANTS (DETERMINATION BY TRIBUNAL) ACT, 1983 was enacted and it was meant for all of India but first enforced only in Assam to deal with the mythical “illegal immigrant” issue raised by vested political quarters. This act gave some sort of relief to the genuine Indian citizens and Assamese/Bengali muslims who were being harassed under the foreigners act 1940 , a british era colonial rule that gave law enforcement agencies unbridled powers to identify, detain & deport “foreigners”. Under the foreigners act the onus of proving someone’s Indian citizenship is on the accused & not on the authorities which is an impossible burden to discharge for most people in the country, who had no birth certificates and no land holdings. The result was that most people were completely at the mercy of the police, who in many places were abusing their powers under the Act to extort money from poor and defenceless people. What IMDT Act did was it put the burden of providing proofs on the authorities. Afterall this is what it should be right? That someone is innocent until proven guilty on the basis of evidence provided by the accuser. But apparently India’s justuice system doesn’t work that way.
The government's statistics showed that in the 20 years of the operation of the IMDT Act, about 80% of the complaints were rejected by the screening committee itself . Out of the remaining 76,228 cases referred to the Tribunals during these years, only 21,169 were disposed off by the Tribunal till 2003. Out of these, 11,636 persons were declared as illegal migrants, but only 1517 could be physically expelled.
An Unconscionable Judgement | Prashant Bhushan
Any way the ASP (asam gono parishod) and BJP were always against this IMDT act since they found that the act was coming in their way to ousting Bengali muslims from Assam. In 2000, a former president of the AASU, Sarbananda Sonowal, filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court seeking a declaration that the IMDT Act was unconstitutional. Thus in 2005 the IMDT act was struck down by Indian supreme court as unconstitutional & upheld the foreigners act to persecute minorities. The court dubbed the entire issue as a “aggression” against India and that the IMDT was coming in the way of expelling foreigners. After this , even a genuine Indian passport, ration card or voter ID card is not enough for a muslim to claim his Indian citizenry. Even children of prominent muslim families are now harassed as illegals. Examples include
●The family members of Syed Abdul Malik, Dr. Moidul Islam Bora and Arif Ali were charged as the Bangladeshis. Syed Abdul Malik was an Ex-Member of Parliament, former President of Asom Sahitya Sabha (Highest Literary body in Assam) and his forefathers were freedom fighters. Dr. Moidul Islam Bora was also happened to be former President of Asom Sahitya Sabha and his ancestors were the Ministers during Ahom rule in Assam. Mr. Arif Ali was the Chairman of Assam Public Service Commission. These insulting raids of Assam police came into limelight only because the affected people were the relatives of famous personalities. Countless similar cases of harassment and atrocities are done to hundreds of illiterate, unconscious, poor and downtrodden Muslims’ everyday but they are unnoticed. (Myth of BD Infiltrators in Assam
●Prakash Vihar is a jhuggi-jhopri colony in New Delhis Rohini area. The colony has about 200 poor Muslim families from West Bengal. Their only source of income is rag picking. Almost all of them have valid proofs of their being Indian citizen some possessing election IDs or ration cards from West Bengal while others have similar documents from Delhi. Yet they are vulnerable to khaki terror and are living at the mercy of the police. (Is every Bangla-speaking poor Muslim in India Bangladeshi migrant? | TwoCircles.net
●Hazrat Khan is living in the colony for seven years. He has election ID both from West Bengal and Delhi. Hailing from Birbhum district in West Bengal Khan earns from rag picking. Khan tells TwoCircles.net. “Though I have valid proofs of being Indian citizen police branded me a Bangladeshi and harasses me. “(Is every Bangla-speaking poor Muslim in India Bangladeshi migrant? | TwoCircles.net
Conclusion
Its well known that Indian politics is driven by anti-muslim communal hysteria and muslims r treated as second clss citizens whether its in NE or Bengal or J&K or UP. But trying to label and steoreotype what mostly are legitimate Indian citizens as “illegals” is something Indian Bengali muslims are the only ones facing. Muslims are taken advantage off by most Indian political parties with communal BJP/RSS openly drumming up anti-muslim hyteria. The congress party is also a Hindtuva party that throws muslims under the bus ones they r done using them for votes. On top of that muslims remain discriminated at all levels including education and jobs as a state policy and muslims are politically also disorganized , though I blame muslims for that. They should become politically more active in India to protect their rights enshrined in Intl human rights charter as well as whatever they can get from the current so called “secular” Indian constitution.
Its important to note here that the ones being targeted are the poorest of the poor most of who have become internally displaced refugees in their own country due to 3 decade of communal violence and natural disasters. The crisis brewing under the guise of rooting out migrants has serious ramification for the region as a whole.
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These Indian don't even know basic counting what do u expect?
