Assam Elections 2021: A look at key issues ahead of poll results

The people of Assam have for long demanded detection and deportation of illegal immigrants from the state citing that migrants from Bangladesh were outnumbering the Assamese-speaking legitimate Indian citizens, leading to the signing of the Assam Accord 1985. The accord set provision for the deportation of all refugees and migrants that entered the state after March 25, 1971. Hence began the process of updating NRC, which was first prepared after the 1951 Census of India, with an aim to count legitimate Indian citizens in Assam.

However, the final updated NRC in 2019 had 31 million names out of a population of 33 million, excluding 1.9 million applicants who were Bengali Hindus, Bengali Muslims and others. The BJP then said it would “correct” it as a large population was left out. However, widespread and violent protests engulfed the state with the BJP’s plan of implementation of CAA. Here’s why:

The protesters say that the implementation of CAA would nullify NRC that aimed to exclude all illegal immigrants irrespective of their religions and lead to migrants – other than Muslims – outnumbering Assamese people.

CAA aims to make Hindu, Christian, Buddhist, Jain, Sikh and Parsi migrants who have entered India illegally on or before December, 31 2014 from the Muslim-majority countries of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh eligible to apply for Indian citizenship. It only excludes Muslims, while Assamese demand deportation of Hindu as well as Muslim and other migrants who have been living in the state illegally.

While the BJP’s manifesto in Assam doesn’t mention anything on the implementation of CAA, the Congress has promised that it will not implement it in the state if it comes to power.

All Assam Law Students Union last year filed a petition in the Supreme Court against CAA saying that the Act threatened to dilute the constitutional and legal safeguards given to the Assamese people, especially the Assam Accord. It said the accord’s main objective was to protect and preserve the culture and identity of the Assamese people by identifying and deporting the illegal immigrants.

“The Clause 6 of the Assam Accord specifically mandates the union government and also the State of Assam to protect the Constitutional, legislative and administrative safeguards of the Assamese people and also provides protection, preservation and promotion of the culture, social, linguistic identity and heritage of the Assamese people. As such under no circumstances, the Union Government could have come up with the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, which dilutes the constitutional, legislative and administrative safeguards of the Assamese people,” the plea said.

The BJP in its manifesto has promised to strengthen and protect Namghars and Satras, establishments that emphasize on "neo-Vaishnav Bhakti movement and a strong Hindu identity".

Top leaders, throughout the campaign, have never failed to highlight how committed they have been to protect Assam’s culture and identity.

“Unlike the BJP who spread lies, we, the Congress party, is committed to protect the culture and identity of Assam,” said Congress leader Rahul Gandhi during a rally.

BJP leader JP Nadda, during one of his rallies, said that the party has worked the most to protect the state's culture and identity. He also mentioned about the Modi govt honouring cultural icons. In one of his rallies, PM Narendra Modi hit out at All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) chief Badruddin Ajmal over not wearing ‘Gamosa’ - an article of significance for the Assamese people.

It is to be noted that the Congress’ failure in giving a boost to the state’s economy had been one of the reasons behind it losing the last elections after former chief minister Tarun Gogoi at the helm for 15 years. The situation, however, hasn’t improved much from 2016, with COVID-19 leaving new challenges to overcome.

While Assam’s unemployment rate has been lower than those of Tamil Nadu, Jharkhand, and Bihar, it still has seen a sharp spike from 0.7 percent in April 2016 to 11.1 percent in April 2020, as per a survey conducted by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE). As of December 2020, this rate stood at 7.6 percent.

The CMIE computes the rate of unemployment "as the number of persons not employed but willing to work and actively looking for a job as a percent of the total labour force, where the total labour force is the sum of all those who are employed and those who are not employed but are willing and looking for a job".

Clearly, the financial assistance and the subsidised rice distribution to the economically weaker class including farmers have been of no help during the crisis, as highlighted by many.

Assam's tea garden workers, who are called “the backbone of the world-class industry”, are also seen as extremely crucial vote banks. However, they still fall under backward communities. The state is in a dire need of a favourable market for agricultural produce.

Most elite caste Assamese have taken over the gardens after independence, leaving the labour lines for tribes and lower-caste workers, who have seen little change in their wages over decades.

While planters cite the rising costs of production for not increasing the wages, tea tribes did the worst on human development indexes, as highlighted by a report.

“A 2019 study by Hazarika and Arakeri V. of a tea-garden sample in Dibrugarh district, which has the highest number of gardens in the state, found the human development index value to be lower (0.25) than the state (0.56) and national average (0.64),” said the Mint Lounge report.

Tea, as a sector, has lost 140 million kg in India in the previous year due to the COVID-19 lockdown. This year, the sector had high hopes but weather concerns in Assam and North Bengal and the restrictions from various states resulted in gloomy months of April and May for the tea market.

Prabir Bhattacharjee, Secretary-General of the Tea Association of India told CNBC-TV18, “There have been problems for the tea industry for the last couple of years. This has heightened last year because of the COVID and this year seems to be affected by the adversities of nature.”

"The production is going to take a hit. 2020 had a subdued production because of the COVID. We are expecting a 20-25 percent drop in production as compared to 2019. These are estimates but I think we have made fair estimates,” said Bhattacharjee.