Mizoram deletes over 2000 Bru voters from state electoral roll

The names of more than 2,000 Bru voters have been erased from the electoral record of Mizoram following their enrollment in nearby Tripura's voter list, an election official said.

According to Mizoram Joint Chief Electoral Officer David Liansanglura Pachuau, the state election administration has received over 3,000 deletion requests from its Tripura counterpart so far.

Of this, the names of 2,091 Bru voters have been deleted from Mizoram's voter list to date and deletion of the remaining voters is proceeding, he added.

The source stated the Bru voters, who migrated to Tripura after not returning to Mizoram during repatriations, were electors of nine assembly seats in three districts of Mizoram.

According to him, 1,643 of the disenfranchised Bru voters came from Mamit, 187 from Kolasib, and 262 from the Lunglei area. He stated that the deletion was carried out in accordance with the demands given by the Tripura Election Department through Electoral Roll Officer Net (ERONet).

Pachuau stated that they have asked their colleagues in Tripura to hasten the inclusion of Bru voters in the state's voter list because Mizoram is scheduled to hold assembly elections next year.

Following ethnic hostilities sparked by the death of a Mizo forest officer by Bru militants in 1997, thousands of Bru voters moved to Tripura. They have spent more than two decades in transit camps since then.

The initial repatriation effort, in November 2009, was not only thwarted by the Bru militants' murder of a Mizo villager, but it also provoked another round of departure.

Between 2009 and 2019, the Centre and the governments of Mizoram and Tripura attempted at least nine times to repatriate the Bru tribals from Tripura.

On January 16, 2020, the Centre, the governments of Mizoram and Tripura, and leaders of many Bru organizations reached an agreement that permitted approximately 35,000 displaced Bru tribals who were unwilling to return to Mizoram during repatriation to reside permanently in Tripura.