At the same time, Assam is also on the boil as the Narendra Modi government has plans to amend the Citizenship Act to grant citizenship to Hindus and other minorities, barring Muslims, living in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. The move is largely aimed at granting citizenship to Bengali speaking Hindus who have migrated to Assam and ready to migrate once the Bill comes into  reality. Expectedly, Assam believes with the granting of citizenship to a large number of Bengali Hindus from Bangladesh, the state’s already changed demography will further see changes pushing the indigenous people to minorities. Already, the Hindu Bengalis had started a movement for separate Barak Valley state encompassing all Hindu Bengali migrants. 

Meanwhile there are apprehensions in the neighbouring states that once the NRC draft is published a large number of people who have entered India far back of the cut-off year may find themselves aliens and they may infiltrate to neighbouring states like Meghalaya, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, etc.  The fear of influx of people who do not belong to indigenous communities, has become a sensitive political issue across the region. Several neighbouring states have stepped up security at inter-state borders with Assam. All the other six states in the North East share borders with Assam.

 

At the same time, the Arunachal Pradesh administration sees “no challenge” in the wake of the publication of the final draft in Assam. “In the form of the inner line permit, a mechanism is already there,” said a spokesperson for chief minister Pema Khandu some time back. But will it prevent influx?