CAA unacceptable to Assam's indigenous population: AJP chief Lurinjyoti Gogoi

AJP president Lurinjyoti Gogoi opposes CAA in Assam, a critical issue in 2024 elections, fighting for indigenous rights.

The indigenous people of Assam can “never accept” the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which will be a critical issue in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, asserted Dibrugarh Parliamentary constituency's Opposition candidate Lurinjyoti Gogoi, also the president of Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP).

“The illegal influx of foreigners has been a long-standing cause for concern in Assam, and the BJP has now legalised it with this act, which is unacceptable to the people,” Mr. Gogoi told PTI in an interview, amid campaigning, in Assam’s Margherita.

"Assam has borne the burden of illegal foreigners till 1971, and now, another 43 years till 2014 has been added to it,” he said. "How can the people accept this? There was a long-drawn agitation in the State against illegal influx and with the CAA, the identity of the Assamese is at stake,” Mr. Gogoi claimed.

The United Opposition Forum Assam (UOFA) had announced Mr. Gogoi, the AJP president, as the candidate for the Dibrugarh Lok Sabha seat, from where Union Minister Sarbananda Sonowal is contesting as a BJP nominee.

The Centre had in March implemented the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, notifying the rules four years after the law was passed by Parliament to fast-track citizenship for undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who came to India before December 31, 2014.

The CAA is “completely motivated, communal and unconstitutional, and a ploy of the BJP to burden Assam and its resources further,” Mr. Gogoi alleged. "Our constitution has the principle of secularism enshrined in it, but the act is based on religious division,” he claimed.

The Opposition parties have been protesting against the CAA, and “this is a very serious and dangerous issue, which will also have an economic, social, cultural and linguistic impact on the people of the state,” the AJP chief said.