The death toll in firing and arson along the Assam-Nagaland border by alleged miscreants from Nagaland has increased to 11 with the recovery of nine more bodies from the disturbed Uriamghat area of Assam on Friday even as night curfew continued.
The police on Thursday booked litterateur Hiren Gohain, Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti chief Gogoi and senior journalist Manjit Mahanta under sedition charges for their comments on the Citizenship Amendment Bill.
Former CM Tarun Gogoi on Wednesday accepted his responsibility for the Congress' debacle in Assam assembly polls.
Sonowal's name as the party's face came as no surprise as he came with a clean image and no baggage and enjoyed the confidence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
'There are 17 million Hindus in Bangladesh and we, in the north east, see this Citizenship (Amendment) Bill as a route for them to enter India on the plea that they are facing persecution in Bangladesh.'
The BJP knows the CAA, combined with a fresh nationwide NRC process, is an idea that's dead on arrival. Where it lives on is as a divisive, polarising instrument as its rivals have to take a position against it and thereby be exposed to the charge of 'Muslim appeasement' again, points out Shekhar Gupta.
'If there are provocations and people try to exploit and manipulate the situation along linguistic, religious lines, then Assam might relapse into its troubled past.'
The TMC team went there at the instruction of party supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
'The Bodos and the Assamese were at each other's throats, the Assamese Muslims and the Bengali Muslims were at each other's throats, the Bengali speaking Muslims and Hindus were coming together against the Assamese speaking caste Hindus and the plains tribes and vice versa.'
The visit of a high-level delegation of revenue officials from Bangladesh to India-Bangladesh border areas in Dhubri sector in western Assam has triggered sharp protests by political and non-political groups in Assam.
The bill seeks to provide Indian citizenship to non-Muslims from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The HMO said it will amend the rules to increase the time limit of filing of appeals in foreigners tribunals from 60 to 120 days for those who would be excluded from the final NRC.
The citizens' register in Assam does not get to the bottom of things.
'If the Citizenship Bill passes, then the very principle of Indian citizenship, which is called jus soli (right of birthplace) will convert to principle of jus sanguinis (right of blood) on the basis of religion.' 'Citizenship is being given on the basis of religion and it is against the Constitution.'
Kumar's comments at the party's national executive meeting came amid a strain in his ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party and appears to be a message to his ally, some of whose leaders have been linked to alleged communal tensions and violence in the state.
'We want to protect our history, we want to protect our people from getting overwhelmed by the influx from Bangladesh, that is why the people of Assam are out in the streets,' says former Assam chief minister and Asom Gana Parishad leader Prafulla Kumar Mahanta.
The BJP, on the other hand, learnt from past mistakes to clinch power.
The government has displayed a tin ear in its responses to the JNU protests by using the sedition law -- and by encouraging lawyers who wear their political affiliations on their sleeves to display utter contempt for the Constitution. The Modi Sarkar has over three years of its term to run. But it may well have already sown the seeds of defeat,' says Devangshu Datta.
'If the Amendment Bill 2016 becomes law, the indigenous people of Assam will become a minority and the language, literature and culture of Assam will be lost.'
Anti-CAB protests intensify in Guwahati even as the PM appealed for calm, assuring the people of the state that the govt will protect their interests.
What the Congress will have to understand is that it is not enough to have a 40-something vice-president in New Delhi, but young faces with fresh ideas in the states,' says Amulya Ganguli.
'As demonetisation showed us, the Shah-Modi duo can take big risks.' 'Risking economic damage for political benefit, however, is one thing, stoking old fires in complicated Assam is another', warns Shekhar Gupta.
Scheduled to be completed in 2016, the 4.94 km rail-cum-road bridge, India's longest bridge, will come up across the mighty Brahmaputra at Bogibeel in Assam. It is not only expected to be a lifeline for the Northeast, but will also strengthen the country's security.
'There is a design of fundamentalists that the north east must become an Islamic country.'
Those who have studied Assam elections say the high turnout has the Congress worried.
The death toll on Wednesday climbed to 68 in the series of attacks by suspected Bodo militants belonging to the National Democratic Front of Bodoland faction in Sonitpur and Kokrajhar districts of Assam while the Centre was rushing additional forces to the state.
'The win in Assam is likely to have a ripple effect in other north-eastern states like Manipur and Nagaland which have been reluctant to embrace the BJP in the past,' says Nitin A Gokhale, the distinguished commentator on strategic affairs, who lived and reported from Assam between 1983 and 2006.
The real brilliance of this RSS campaign, therefore, lies in building a dominant power base with, and for, a mostly non-RSS leadership. That is why the rise of the BJP in Assam is their stand-out victory, says Shekhar Gupta.
In the light of the global scenario on infiltration for economic gain what Modi said in his speeches in Assam and West Bengal recently was perfectly legitimate. Intellectual dishonesty marks this discourse in our country, argues Ram Madhav.
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