Assam: 12 Hrs Barak Valley Bandh, Around 500 people have been detained

KARIMGANJ / SILCHAR-   Around 500 people have been detained in Assam’s Barak Valley during a 12-hour-bandh against the draft proposal the Election Commission of India (ECI ) released this month.

The 12-hour bandh started at 5am on Tuesday and it has received support from the common people. The streets were empty since morning and almost all the shops are closed in three districts of Barak Valley.

According to Police sources 206 were detained in Cachar, 184 in Karimganj, and 91 in Hailakandi until 2pm.

The protesters chanted slogans against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). One of them asked the police to shoot him instead of arresting him while protesting in front of the Cachar deputy commissioner’s office.

“This delimitation will reduce our presentation at the state assembly. We are already deprived and it will increase our deprivation further. The state government is killing us slowly. It s better if they shoot us at once,” he said.

• The  12-hour bandh initiated by several political parties including the Congress and the AIUDF, against the plan to reduce the number of Assembly seats in some areas. The bandh took place in several districts of the Barak Valley, including Cachar Halakandi, and Karimganj.
• President of Congress’s Cachar district committee, Abhijit Paul was arrested by the police on Tuesday morning.
• The working president of APCC, Kamalakhya Dey Purkayastha has also been arrested.

Last week, the ECI had published a draft proposal for delimitation of Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies in Assam as part of the first delimitation exercise in the state since 1976.

As per the proposal, the number of Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies would remain the same — 14 and 126, respectively — but there are proposed changes in boundaries and names, and addition of new constituencies in some areas and reduction in others.

The three districts of Barak Valley – Cachar, Karimganj and Hailakandi – had 15 assembly constituencies till 2021 elections but the new draft reduces the number to 13. Apart from demographic changes, the names of a few constituencies will also be changed as per the proposal.

Leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party, Opposition parties including Congress, Trinamool Congress, AIUDF and left parties, and voters are opposing the proposal due to the reduction and reshuffling of seats.

In the draft, the ECI has proposed reducing assembly seats of Hailakandi from three to two. The Katlicherra constituency will be removed if the proposed draft gets finalised. According to media report, Algapur MLA, Sujam Uddin Laskar, from AIUDF, said that he’ll move to Guwahati High Court against this decision.