Author: Wasbir Hussain
Publication: South Asia Terrorism
Portal
Date: September 20, 2004
URL: http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/sair/index.htm
Associate Fellow, Institute for
Conflict Management, New Delhi; Consulting Editor, The Sentinel, Guwahati
According to the National Census
of 2001, the Muslim population in the Northeast Indian State of Assam is
30.9 per cent out of a total of 26.6 million. Although the last Census
was conducted three years ago, it was only on September 6, 2004, that the
office of the Registrar General of India, which carries out census operations,
released the statistical break-up on religious lines. The latest figures
demonstrate that the proportionate growth of the Muslim population in Assam,
in comparison with other religious communities, is second only to Jammu
and Kashmir (67 per cent Muslims).
The 2001 Census put Assam's population
at 26,655,528. Of this, 17,296,455 were recorded as Hindus and 8,240,611
Muslims. Among the critical elements made public by the Census authorities
is the fact that six of Assam's 27 districts have a majority Muslim population.
The district of Barpeta tops the list with 977,943 Muslims and 662,066
Hindus. The other five districts where Muslims constitute a majority: Dhubri,
Goalpara, Nagaon, Karimganj and Hailakandi.
The issue of Muslim population growth
in Assam has a disturbing resonance. The State has long been in the grip
of a murky politics of citizenship over the issue of unabated illegal migration
from adjoining Bangladesh, with which it shares a 262 kilometre long border.
The particular significance of the recently released Census data is the
fact that the rates of growth of Muslim populations are the highest precisely
in the districts that share a border with, or lie close to the border with,
Bangladesh - particularly Dhubri, Barpeta, Karimganj and Hailakandi - giving
credence to the widely held belief that illegal migration from Bangladesh
was the source of these demographic trends. Such migration clearly continues
unhindered, despite the barbed-wire fence being erected in stretches and
the presence of the Border Security Force (BSF) along the border.
A look at the census figures of
1971 and 1991 (there was no census in Assam in 1981 due to unrest in the
State) shows that there has been a steady to rapid rise in the Muslim population
in districts proximate to the border, confirming apprehensions of a continuing
illegal influx. This, perhaps, goes a long way to explain the rather high
Muslim growth rate in Assam, estimated at 77.42 per cent between 1971 and
1991.
In 1971, Muslims, for instance,
comprised 64.46 per cent of the population in Dhubri district. This rose
to 70.45 per cent in 1991 - a total growth of 77.42 per cent between 1971
and 1991. By 2001 the proportion of Muslims had risen further to 74.29
per cent of the population in Dhubri. By 2001, the Muslim population in
Barpeta rose from 56.07 per cent in 1991 to 59.3 per cent; in Goalpara,
from 50.18 per cent to 53.71 per cent, and Hailakandi from 54.79 per cent
57.6 per cent. Significantly, two new districts joined the list of Muslim
majority districts in Assam by 2001: Karimganj, where the Muslim population
rose from 49.17 per cent in 1991 to 52.3 per cent; and Nagaon, where the
community's population grew from 47.19 per cent in 1991 to 50.99 per cent.
There is need to make a clear distinction,
here, between indigenous Assamese-speaking Muslims and Bangladeshi migrants
before analyzing the demographic and security implications of such population
growth. Aside from Guwahati, Assam's capital (that is part of the Kamrup
Metro district), the heartland of the indigenous Assamese Muslims - whose
origins can be traced to the forays of the pre-Mughals in the 13th century
- is located around the tea growing eastern districts of Jorhat, Golaghat,
Sivasagar and Dibrugarh. In Jorhat district the Muslims comprised just
3.89 per cent of the total population in 1971, rising to 4.32 per cent
in 1991. The growth rate was 48.04 per cent between 1971 and 1991. In Sivasagar,
Muslims accounted for 6.65 per cent of the population in 1971, climbing
to 7.63 per cent in 1991; in Dibrugarh from 3.66 per cent of the total
population in 1971 to 4.49 per cent in 1991; and in Golaghat, Muslims comprised
5.17 per cent of the population in 1971, rising to 7.11 per cent in 1991.
It is useful to note, in this context, that the growth rate of the Hindu
population in Jorhat, Sivasagar, Dibrugarh and Golaghat was between 32
and 49 per cent over the 1971-1991 period, closely comparable to the rates
of growth for the indigenous Muslim populations.
Evidently, the Muslim growth rate
in areas dominated by indigenous Assamese-speaking Muslims, located far
from the Bangladesh border, have been registering marginal increases, as
compared to areas located close to the border.
With these startling facts being
brought to light, influential groups, such as the All Assam Students' Union
(AASU ) - which had led the six-year-long anti-foreigner (that is, anti-Bangladeshi)
uprising in the State between 1979 and 1985 - have once again upped the
ante, reiterating fears that the illegal aliens will eventually overwhelm
the indigenous population. They have also stepped up demands for effective
action against this unremitting population offensive, including the updating
of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), with 1971 as the cut-off year.
The population explosion in Bangladesh,
with 2.8 million added every year in one of the poorest and most densely
populated countries in the world, creates the push factors for this silent
demographic invasion. These are, however, compounded by an expansionist
political ideology, implicitly or explicitly supported in the corridors
of power in Bangladesh: the idea of Lebensraum ('living space'), which
has been variously projected by the country's leadership for a long time,
though the use of the expression itself is relatively recent. In the early
nineties, Sadeq Khan, a former diplomat, stated:
All projections, however, clearly
indicate that by the next decade, that is to say by the
first decade of the 21st century,
Bangladesh will face a serious crisis of lebensraum. A natural overflow
of population pressure is very much on the cards and will not be restrainable
by barbed wire or border patrol measures. The natural trend of population
overflow from Bangladesh is towards the sparsely populated lands in the
South East, in the Arakan side and of the North East in the Seven Sisters
side of the Indian sub- continent.
The idea had found repeated articulation
even before the creation of Bangladesh, and enumerated, among its supporters,
Shiekh Mujibur Rahman, the country's first Prime Minister.
The AASU and other organizations
behind the anti-foreigner movement in the State had, at the height of their
agitation in the mid-Nineteen Eighties, estimated the number of illegal
migrants in Assam to be as high as 4.5 to 5 million, or 31 to 34 per cent
of the total population of the State in 1971. As recently as on July 14,
2004, India's Minister of State for Home, Sriprakash Jaiswal, had told
the Rajya Sabha (Upper House of Parliament) that there were 5 million illegal
Bangladeshis in Assam. Groups such as the AASU reacted, saying that their
fears and estimates had been officially confirmed. Later, on July 23 another
Minister of State for Home, Manik Rao Gavit clarified in Parliament that
his colleague's statement was not based on any comprehensive study, but
"on hearsay." But such glaring contradictions simply demonstrated the oft-leveled
charge that political parties, in fact, lack the will to tackle the issue
for fear of losing a massive 'vote bank'. With the census figures indirectly
confirming the alarming picture of mass illegal migrations from Bangladesh,
sparks are expected to fly in Assam.
Ironically, however, after the AASU
leaders transformed themselves into politicians, forming the Asom Gana
Parishad (AGP) in the winter of 1985 to contest the State Legislative Assembly
polls and to capture power in Assam with the key promise of ridding the
State of the illegal Bangladeshi migrants, the party, did little to identify
and deport the aliens when it was in Government. In a span of nearly ten
years, spread over two terms, the AGP Government in Assam deported fewer
than 1,500 illegal migrants, blaming the poor progress in the exercise
of detection and expulsion on loopholes in the controversial Illegal Migrants
(Determination by Tribunals) Act, 1983 (IMDT).
The IMDT Act operates only in Assam,
while the Foreigners Act, 1946, applies to the rest of the country. Under
the IMDT Act, the onus of proving the citizenship of an accused 'illegal
alien' lies on the accuser, whereas in the Foreigners Act, the onus lies
with the accused. Given the infirmities of the Act and the absence of political
will, progress has been extremely slow. The Union Ministry of Home Affairs
admits that the functioning of the IMDT Act has been "unsatisfactory",
and in a presentation in mid- 1999, in connection with a court case, disclosed
that action under the Act had been taken as follows:
* Total enquiries (against suspected
illegal migrants) initiated: 3,02,554;
* Enquiries referred to the Screening
Committee: 2,96,564;
* Enquiry reports referred to the
IMDT Tribunals: 31,264;
* Persons declared as illegal migrants
by the IMDT Tribunals: 9,625;
* Number of illegal migrants expelled:
1,461.
In November 1998, the then Governor
of Assam, Lt. Gen. (Retd) S.K.Sinha presented a 42-page official report
to the President of India on 'Illegal Migration into Assam,' noting:
As a result of population movement
from Bangladesh, the spectre looms large of the
indigenous people of Assam being
reduced to a minority in their home state. This silent and invidious demographic
invasion of Assam may result in the loss of the geo- strategically vital
districts of Lower Assam [on the border with Bangladesh]. The influx of
these illegal migrants is turning these districts into a Muslim majority
region. It will then only be a matter of time when a demand for their merger
with Bangladesh may be made.
If current trends of inflow of population
continue unchecked, the security implications, not only for Assam, but
for the entire Northeast region, could be disastrous.
