SHILLONG, DEC 19: The Meghalaya Legislative Assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a resolution to urge the Centre to implement ‘The Inner Line ‘ under the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873 in the state of Meghalaya.
The resolution which also seeks to make necessary amendment to the BEFR, 1983 for inclusion of Meghalaya in its Preamble, was moved by Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma during a special session held here on Tuesday.
Members across party lines including opposition Congress supported the resolution.
“The House has spoken extensively in support of this resolution irrespective of party affiliation. The house has spoken in one voice on this very important government resolution and we stand united and committed to serve for the welfare and the interest of the people of our state,” Assembly Speaker Metbah Lyngdoh said after his order to vote on the resolution was received with a thumping majority “ayes”.
While moving the resolution, Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said the proposal is to implement “The Inner Line” for safeguarding the interest of the citizens of the state of Meghalaya was because provisions in the CAA “will not be adequate” to protect and safeguard the interests of the tribal population of the state.
“Although the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 has provided that it shall not apply to tribal area of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram or Tripura as included in the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution, this provision will not be adequate to protect and safeguard the interests of the tribal population of the state,” Conrad said.
He also said the Meghalaya government will keep on pursuing for total exemption of the state from the purview of the CAA even as 22,900 sq km is exempted while 100 square km of non-scheduled areas is not exempted.
He further said the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 coming into force “has necessitated the introduction of a mechanism to further protect the rights of the indigenous/tribal population.”
Replying to the discussion before passing the resolution, Conrad said this ILP resolution is not something that will have to go to Parliament but it only requires a notification to be made by the President of India.
“In that notification, the President of India has to simply insert the word Meghalaya in the Preamble…I hope as we go together not just the 60 legislators but 33 lakh people of Meghalaya to Delhi and in one voice say we want ILP, I am sure we will get a positive response…,” he said.
Conrad also said that the ILP resolution should have been passed long time back. “We would have implemented ILP without having to move this resolution but we missed this chance. However, I am not here to blame anybody but now that we are in this position, we need to move forward.”
He assured that the state government will continue to work with the government of India to ensure ILP is implemented in the state.
The chief minister also said that the state government has a very important role to play while the government of India is trying to implement the amended Citizenship Act as none of the applications for citizenship can move forward without the consent of the state.
“Although we ware working towards achieving 100 percent (exemption from CAA), it is however up to the state government and the deputy commissioners to process any application that comes in. Therefore the state government has a very important role to play in that aspect,” he said.
On the question of how many applications that have come from people who want citizenship through the state of Meghalaya, Conrad said the reply to that is less than five as he declared that all of them are invalid since Meghalaya has been exempted.
“There are only two applications have been given to us but right now both these applications are invalid because Meghalaya has been exempted and therefore there is no question of them applying,” he said.
Asserting the need to dispel all misconception, Conrad said the government will ensure proper mechanism where deputy commissioners will inform people about the fact of the CAA. “We will ensure all other provisions including MRSSA and we will ensure ILP movement will continue,” he added.
By Our Reporter
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