The Indian Express (Delhi Edition)
Unlike 2019, CAA buzz missing in Silchar now, but BJP holds steady
BJP has the backing of Bengali Hindus. Congress is still stinging from departure of Sushmita Dev to the TMC
WHEN SILCHAR in Assam was submerged under a devastating flood in June 2022, Nikhil Das, 36, and his family spent 25 days on the tin roof of their kutcha house. He points to a bridge that was built later that year and flags it as an example of “development”. He says this is one of the reasons for his support to the BJP.
Nikhil is a resident of Tapoban Nagar, a settlement largely of the Hindu Bengali migrants on the outskirts of Silchar in the Barak Valley. Like many locals, his name did not feature in the final draft of the National Register of Citizens ( NRC) in Assam published in 2019.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the ruling BJP'S promise to ensure the Citizenship Amendment Act ( CAA) in the event of its return to power, garnered mass support from the Hindu Bengali community in the Barak Valley. This region – which shares over 125- km- long border with Bangladesh – saw the influx of a large Bengali Hindu population following Partition.
The BJP pledged that the Act would bring relief to the Bengali Hindus facing citizenship challenges by easing and fast- tracking the citizenship process for such migrants.
However, the hopes among many Bengali Hindus that the CAA would bring relief to them seem to have dimmed now. The Indian Express has reported how the process for applying under the Act, which requires documentation to prove that the applicant is a Bangladeshi national, poses a new challenge to those grappling with citizenship issues.
While campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections in the Brahmaputra Valley – where the CAA is seen in conflict with the 1985 Assam Accord – Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that so far only one person applied for citizenship under the Act, a person from the Barak Valley. Sarma has repeatedly stated in public meetings in Silchar that the citizenship issues of the Bengali Hindus would be resolved “within 6 months”.
Nikhil is holding on to such a promise. “The BJP is saying we will be able to apply ( for citizenship) somewhere after the election... Everyone is saying something will be done,” he says.
The support for the BJP is visible across his settlement. Dulona Das, 21, whose family moved there after several years spent in a refugee camp, points to several houses under construction there under the PM Awas Yojana. “Our house is also being built. We’ve been getting free rice. They’ve done a lot of work for us,” she says.
Kumud Das, a resident of the Kali Bari Char slum inhabited largely by Hindu Bengalis, sums up his stand on the citizenship matter. “Here we have been hearing of nagarikta ( citizenship) issues our whole lives. Parties which raise the issue talk about it for a few days and then forget about it. So here, we all stand with the BJP. They have given us ration cards, made roads,” he says.
Despite the perceived disappointment among a section of locals over the CAA affair, the BJP looks set to sail through in Silchar, one of the Barak Valley's two Lok Sabha seats, with the backing of a large section of Bengali Hindus, goodwill towards its candidate Parimal Suklabaidya, even as the Opposition totters.
A BJP minister, Parimal is currently the MLA from the Dholai
Assembly seat. The Congress was hit by the exit of its most prominent face in the region, Sushmita Dev, who was elected to the Lok Sabha in 2014 from Silchar but lost in 2019 to the BJP'S Rajdeep Roy by over 81,000 votes. She joined the TMC. The Congress has now fielded a relatively unknown face, Suryakant Sarkar.
“There is not much of a contest here. The main contest here is for second place. The TMC doesn’t have much of an organisational structure. It is basically a Bengali party, and it is pitching itself accordingly here,” says Joydeep Biswas, a teacher at Cachar College.
Last week, TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee made her first visit to Barak Valley since becoming the West Bengal CM in 2011 to address an election rally in Silchar, appealing to Bengalis – both Hindus and Muslims – to join hands over their linguistic identity to vote out the BJP.
However, the space for the Opposition parties seems to be shrinking in the constituency going to polls on April 26.
In Madhubond, a Muslim settlement in East Silchar, several voters say they have decided to switch their support from the Congress to the BJP and do not see other parties as viable options. ‘
“We haven’t yet seen the development we hear about but I feel like it’s better to go for the BJP,” says Sahil Laskar, 33, who works as a driver.
“The TMC is not ready and we haven’t seen them here. Under the BJP, at least some work is happening. Even Muslims are getting schemes like Orunodoi ( an Assam government scheme),” he says, ehoing the BJP'S pitch on “inclusive development”.