Assam man held for allegedly sharing contacts with Bangladeshi JMB outfit

One person was arrested in Dhubri district for allegedly sending phone numbers of several local residents to the fundamentalist outfit Jamat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on August 27.

The chief minister alleged that JMB has been attempting to create disturbances in the state and warned that strict action would be taken against anyone aiding such groups.

The arrested man, who is an Indian, was the main conduit who supplied phone numbers to the JMB, and its members would then dial those people with the intention to radicalise them, the chief minister said at a press conference in Guwahati.

The arrested person, Ali Hussain Bepari, had also been apprehended earlier but was out on bail, he said.

The police are in the last stage of the investigation, and more details are likely to emerge soon, Sarma said.

A strict vigil is being kept in the districts of Dhubri and South Salmara which borders Bangladesh, he said.

"South Salmara has been peaceful for the last five years, but there have been several activities in recent times in Dhubri. So, we have decided to continue with the shoot-at-sight orders at night during the Durga Puja as we are apprehensive about the law and order situation," the chief minister said.

He said that no FIR will be filed against former Planning Commission member Sayeeda Hamid for saying that Bangladeshis can also live here.

"If I file an FIR, then she will collect contributions from different parts of the country to fight the case. She will be only enriched," he said.

If she, however, comes back to Assam, the state government will do what is required to be done according to the law, the CM said.

Sarma had earlier said that it was people like her who seek to realise Muhammad Ali Jinnah's dream of making Assam a part of Pakistan by legitimising infiltrators.

The chief minister said that since the Assam agitation around four decades ago, no Bangladeshi had been deported, but now "every week we are pushing back 70-100 people who are trying to enter the country".

He said that it is a fact that Assam and the North East are used as a corridor by the infiltrators.

Regarding the National Register of Citizens (NRC), Sarma alleged that the "people of Assam have been cheated as there are many anomalies in the list with many doubtful entries made".

Cases in this regard are pending in the Supreme Court, he said.

The final NRC released on August 31, 2019, excluded 19,06,657 applicants. A total of 3,11,21,004 names were included out of 3,30,27,661 applicants. It has, however, not yet been notified.

"Our final aim is to ensure that the Centre, Supreme Court or the Assam government, within its powers, examine the legal angle and find a solution as the existing NRC cannot be accepted by us," he said.

During its publication, the court had said that the list is final and so "it can be notified, following which the state government will ask for updating it," Sarma told reporters.

Regarding the reporting by a section of the foreign media on the eviction of encroachers in the state, the CM said that he has no fascination for them and "does not watch their coverage".

"In Prime Minister Narendra Modi's regime, we are out of the colonial era. For us, all national or local media are equal. Besides, how much time will foreign media give us - maybe five or 10 minutes and this will not affect our voters," he added.