PM Modi to visit Assam on Feb 7; he had earlier cancelled two state visits amid CAA row

GUWAHATI: PM Narendra Modi is expected to visit Assam on Feb 7 to address a public rally at Kokrajhar in the Bodo Territorial Area District (BTAD).

On January 27, an agreement signed between the Centre, the Assam government and Bodo stakeholders (NDFB and its factions) saw the announcement of various measures to ensure the territorial and cultural integrity of the region. Several institutes will be set up to bring growth and development to the region.

“The visit is a celebration of the Memorandum of Settlement the government signed with various Bodo groups, including militant groups, last week. There will be a speech by the PM and various cultural programmes will be organised,” a home ministry official said, according to media reports.

Sources say PM Modi will also address the public on issues related to CAA.

PM Modi will fly in Guwahati and then take a chopper to Kokrajhar. Later, he will fly to West Bengal and then to Delhi.

Assam was the first state to protest against CAA.

CAA aims to protect religiously persecuted Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan by giving them Indian Citizenship. The cut-off date for those to be given citizenship in India has been fixed at, on or before 31st December 2014.

People in Assam see this as a violation of the Assam Accord that had set March 25, 1971, as the cut-off date for the detection and deportation of illegal foreigners from the State.

People of Assam have expressed fear and anxiety that CAA would regularize citizenship of several outsiders in the state and thus it will impact its demography and ethnocultural integrity.

Modi who was about to visit the state for the third Khelo India Youth Games had cancelled his visit. The third Khelo India Youth Games were organized in Guwahati from January 10 to 22. The All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), Asom Jatiyatabadi Yuva Chatra Parishad (AJYCP), had announced a series of agitations if the PM visited Assam.

Meeting between PM Narendra Modi of India and Shinzo Abe of Japan was postponed due to widespread anti-CAA protests in Guwahati, where the two leaders were set to meet in December 2019.

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