Assam government to review the functioning of Foreigners’ Tribunals

 Staff Reporter

Guwahati: The Assam government will review the functioning of the Foreigners’ Tribunals (FTs) in the state, it was announced today.

At present, 100 FTs are operational in the state. A total of 2,44,144 ‘D’ voter cases have been forwarded to FTs as of December 31, 2023. Out of these, 1,49,732 cases have been disposed of by the FTs, and 94,412 cases are pending in different FTs in the state at present.

MLA Kamalakshya Dey Purkayastha today drew the attention of the government to several doubtful judgements by these FTs and urged the government to look into the matter. Replying to this, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that several complaints regarding FTs have come to the attention of the government and assured that they would be looked into after the Lok Sabha election in the state. The CM said that ‘D’ voters were introduced by the Election Commission of India in 1997 and directed that the names of all such persons, against whom the electoral registration officers had reasonable doubt about their claims of being citizens of India and sent to the FT for determination of their citizenship status, may be indicated by the letter ‘D’ after each such name to denote that their citizenship status is doubtful or disputed.

The Assam government has taken a decision not to consider Gorkhas as foreigners because, according to the Indo-Nepal Agreement, there is free movement of people across the border between the two countries, the CM stated. Many Gorkhas have been appointed in the Indian Army for a long time, and the Chief Minister announced that a decision has been taken to withdraw all cases against Gorkhas at the FTs.

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