Even as the deadline set by agitating All Bodo Students' Union and All-Koch-Rajbongshi Students' Union for announcement of dates for tripartite talks by the Centre over their demand for separate state almost comes to an end, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi to apprise them of the situation back home.
Relief camps in Assam's Kokrajhar and Barpeta districts have 4,615 new refugees, while 376 have left for home in Chirang district since Sunday. In Kokrajhar, 4,587 people have sought refuge where 60,252 are housed in 50 camps while in Chirang, there are 31,442 refugees in 24 camps, official sources said on Monday.
Assembly elections in Assam used to be a quiet affair and people outside the state would take little interest in the outcome. This time, even in faraway Delhi, people are keeping tabs on political developments in Assam.
As the counting begins on Friday the public focus in Assam will be mainly on how helpful the 'Modi Wave' has been for the Bharatiya Janata Party to challenge a confident Congress in Assam. Both the parties have contested in 13 out of 14 parliamentary seats.
Besides, less than 200 applications have been received by the authorities challenging the inclusion of the names of suspected illegal immigrants in the NRC, a list of Assam's residents, two months after a window was opened for claims and objections.
'This movement is not about Hindus, Muslims or Bengalis, but about all Assamese, irrespective of their religious faith or economic class'
'The kind of situation we are seeing...we don't believe that this can happen in a settled democracy like India'
The Army and Assam Rifles were requisitioned in the night, and along with the state police, the forces arrested the violence by the morning, the spokesperson said.
Twenty odd important political figures and civil society leaders from Assam's conflicts-ridden Bodo heartland have joined Bharatiya Janata Party that has started its 'Mission Bodoland' with bang announcing its intention to provide an alternative to Bodoland people who are fed up with misrule of Bodoland People's Front where has been in power in Bodoland Territorial Autonomous Council over ten years on the trot.
The government views dropout as a barrier to achieving the new National Education Policy's aim of 100 per cent gross enrolment rate at the school level by 2030, according to officials.
Electioneering for the third and the final phase of polling in Assam to be held on April 24 in six constituencies - Gauhati, Dhubri, Kokrajhar, Barpeta, Mangaldoi and Nowgong -- came to an end on Tuesday afternoon with the election department expecting a high turn out on the basis of overwhelming response of voters in the last two phases of polling in the state.
AASU, Cong MP Jairam Ramesh, TMC MP Mahua Moitra, and several NGOs have filed petitions against the act that was assented to by the President yesterday.
Around 800 people, including children and the elderly, are living in pitiable conditions in relief shelters near Thangjing temple and Moirang Lamkhai which are being run by three organisations.
In view of fresh attacks on people from the North East in the rest of India including Delhi and Bengaluru, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on Friday demanded enactment of special deterrent law to prevent such racial attacks.
The student body's leader L Joykumar said it could cause demographic and social changes in the small state.
The TMC team went there at the instruction of party supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
Protests raging in Assam against lynching of rape accused Farid Khan in Dimapur in Nagaland on March 5
AFSPA confers special powers on the armed forces in areas deemed as disturbed.
'The unfolding events indicate a dangerous internal security situation in Manipur and the region. It can have external ramifications also.'
The Imphal Valley in Manipur, which remained peaceful for most of Friday, witnessed sporadic clashes later in the day as more security forces were rushed in from other states by road and air to calm down a state which had witnessed bloody ethnic rioting over the last 48 hours.
Trouble broke out when over 5,000 activists of the All Adivasi Students' Association were marching towards the state assembly after holding a rally at Beltola demanding Scheduled Tribe status for the community.The students vandalised property, torched vehicles, attacked policemen and injured a magistrate after they were obstructed by the police. The locals retaliated and clashed with the protestors resulting in injuries to both sides.
As of now, just about 10 lakh people, out of the total 40 lakh, who were excluded in the draft of the NRC have submitted applications for inclusion of their names in the list of Assam's citizens.
In the petition, the government stated that the act violates "Articles 14, 21, and 25 of the Constitution of India" and is violative of the basic structure principle of secularism as well.
The curfew imposed under Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) will be relaxed from 7 am to 10 am, it said.
Top organisations of the Konyak tribe in Nagaland have announced a set of regulations, including 'strict non-cooperation' with the army, saying the people will follow them until justice is served in the killing of 14 civilians by security forces in a botched up operation and its aftermath in the North-eastern state earlier this month.
At least five persons were injured, one of them critically, when police fired rubber bullets at an unauthorised rally by the All Koch-Rajbongshi Students' Union in Basugaon in western Assam's Chirang district while a bandh called by a militant outfit shutdown the Bodoland Territorial Autonomous District Councilarea in Assam on Tuesday.
The SC issued notice to the Centre on the batch of pleas seeking stay on the operation of the law.
"The charge sheet is in the process of being finalised and is likely to be filed soon."
A bandh called by All Bodoland Minority Students' Union and eight other non-Bodo organisations in protests against killing of at least eight innocent non-Bodo persons by Bodo militant group National Democratic Front of Bodoland (Sangbijit) since Friday has night paralysed life in the violence-affected Bodoland Territorial Autonomous District Council areas in Assam on Monday.
A bandh called by the All Bodoland Minority Students' Union and eight other non-Bodo organisations since Friday night has paralysed life in the violence-affected Bodoland Territorial Autonomous District Council areas in Assam on Monday.
'The north east does not want the solution that the BJP has given and it has become clear that it has not been fully thought through,' says Aakar Patel.
'In other parts of India, people may feel their religious identity is more important, but here in Assam, we are Assamese first and then, anything else. So, we are against this CAB (now CAA). It will hurt the interests of us Assamese'
Bodo tribals influence as many as 30 seats. No wonder, national parties are keen to forge alliances with Bodo groups.
Here's a recap of the events from the past 24 hours.
According to a National Crime Records Bureau report, a total of 356 cases of sedition -- as defined under section 124A of the IPC -- were registered and 548 people arrested between 2015 and 2020, out of which only six were convicted.
The spark for the raging violence was lit by demonstrations by tribal groups against a move to grant the majority Meiteis the Scheduled Tribe status, which the residents of the hills had been enjoying for decades since Independence.
A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India S A Bobde, hearing a petition filed by lawyer Vineet Dhanda seeking stern legal action against those disturbing peace and harmony in the country in the name of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, said, "The country is going through a critical time, the endeavour must be to bring peace and such petitions do not help."
The influential All Bodo Students' Union has given an August 13 ultimatum to communicate a date for holding tripartite dialogue on the union's demand for a separate state for the Bodo tribe in Assam.
He said the accord will lead to transformative results for Bodos as it successfully brings together leading stakeholders under one framework and would help Bodo people get access to development-oriented initiatives.
As results pour in for the four states -- West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Assam -- and one Union Territory -- Puducherry - here's a glimpse at the leaders who are trailing and those who are leading.
