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GUWAHATI: Internet services have been suspended in several parts ofAssam after massive protests against the controversial Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB) for the second consecutive day on Wednesday.
Administration also clamped curfew in Guwahati and other districts after protestors were injured in a lathj charge.
Several protestors, mostly college students along journalists covering the rallies, sustained injuries after the lathi charge and tear gas fired by the police.
Throughout the day young people were on the road burning tyres blocking the movement of vehicles. Though there was no formal strike call business establishments were also shut down.
Earlier in the day students of most of the colleges in Guwahati came out on the roads spontaneously and marched towards the Assam secretariat shouting slogans against the government and the Citizenship Bill.They clashed with the police.
“We can never accept that. This is anti-constitutional. We will not accept any more foreigners in our state,”Ankita Hazarika, a college student taking part in the protest said.
Later in the evening protestors set some vehicles on fire on GS road in Dispur and till late evening most of the streets of the city were blocked.
The bill which endorses citizenship to non-Muslim migrants from the neighbouring countries has been vehemently opposed in the northeast region.
The Bill as introduced in Parliament has exempted states like Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Nagaland (except Dimapur) through special provisions like Inner Line Permit (ILP).Union home minister Amit Shah also announced that ILP will be implemented in Manipur.
The ILP is an official travel document issued by the Government of India to allow travel of an Indian citizen into a protected area for a limited period. But this has not stilled the people’s concerns here.
On December 10, the entire NE states observed a day long bandh called by North East Students Organization (NESO), the umbrella body of all the major students associations of the region.
All Assam Students Union (AASU), one of the most influential organizations of the region which spearheaded the six-year long Assam Agitation to drive out illegal migrants from Assam in the 1980s, is also organising major protests against the Bill.
As per the Assam Accord which was signed after the Assam Agitation, the cut off date to detect illegal citizens is March 24 of 1971 irrespective of their religion, caste and creed.
But CAB now allows all non-Muslim migrants who have come here before December 31, 2014, to become citizens of India.
Tripura also went up in flames with cases of violence reporters from the state.
With the situation getting worse in Assam after thousands of protestors hit the streets, the government has decided to put suspend internet services in at least 10 districts in Assam.
This is after Tripura where the Internet has also been blocked after violence increased over the past two days.
Additional chief secretary of Assam government Kumar Sanjay Krishna in a notification said that mobile internet/ data services will be suspended from 7 pm December 11 for the next 24 hours.
This is a first for Assam in recent memory.
The suspension will affect Lakhimpur, Dhemaji, Tinsukia, Dibrugarh Charaideo, Sivasagar, Jorhat, Golaghat, Kamrup and Kamrup (metro) districts in Assam.
