After Indian parliament passed "Citizenship Amendment Bill", widespread violence was seen in Assam. As explained by ET, the fear among people is that since now India allows citizenship to minority Hindus of Bangladesh, a large number of Bangladeshi Hindu migrants would arrive in Assam; which local people won't like to happen. Is the fear rational?
It may be true that more Bangladeshi Hindu migrants would arrive in India after this bill. But the things to note are as following:
The Hindus in Bangladesh are living in far greater threat and are not able to express themselves as well as their religious sentiments freely. Their daughters are not safe and often women are abducted and forcibly converted into Islam. Indian parliament took up the initiative to protect them by facilitating Indian citizenship to them, if they choose to come to India. This was a noble gesture. And people of Assam must look at this noble angle, instead of their own petty interests.
Today, lakhs of Assamese people are living in all Indian metro cities. In Delhi, they have even created ghettos where you would see more people from Assam and North East than you would see local Delhiites. And no one asks them to go back to their home state. People of Assam must think about it.
But when it comes to allowing people from outside North East into North East, they react as if their local culture would get spoiled merely if 100 people from outside their state start living in their city or town. Local politicians playing the race card and regional card merely exploit their sentiments. If people did not support their racist policies, how would political parties exploit them?
People of Assam must stop being racists. They must stop being hypocritical where they themselves are living in very large numbers in all Indian cities but do not allow others to live in their state. Also, it is not reasonable to expect that lakhs of Bangladeshi Hindus will really arrive in India. Since not all people decide to migrate; there are always risks in migration. Plus, not all Bangladeshi people would choose to live in Assam, when they already know that local Assamese people are racists and hostile to others. So the fear of Assamese people may be true only to a less extent.
Assamese people living outside Assam must call their folks in the state and ask them to calm down. They should stop burning buses and public infrastructure since it is a suicidal step. Once they will destroy all the railways and government infrastructure and later they will cry that no development happens in their city. The large participation of young students is also weird. After education, most of these students will head to Delhi and other India metro cities like Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad. How would they show their face to the outside world, if they do open violence against so called "outsiders" like this? And what will others think about them; does education bring no sense of civilized behavior in them?
Let us hope Assam returns to normalcy soon and violence stops there as soon as possible.
