Minister Pijush Hazarika alleges PFI behind violence in anti-CAA protest

GUWAHATI: Much before the Union Ministry of Home Affairs banned the Popular Front of India (PFI) under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), 2019 on September 28, 2022 for five years, a minister of Assam revealed that the PFI orchestrated the violence during the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) agitation.

The anti-CAA protests had first started in Assam, parts of West Bengal and other north-eastern states in 2019 and continued till 2020 before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. At least five persons were killed in the protests against the CAA in Assam, which also witnessed large-scale violence and imposition of curfew for several days.

Assam Minister of Information and Public Relations, Pijush Hazarika, who is also the spokesman of the State Government, had said that the PFI was a threat to the country and they were engaged in violent agitations against the CAA in the State. "The PFI were fanning religious sentiments to disestablish the State and had a plan of merging Assam with Bangladesh. They should be banned permanently," the minister had said.

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma also said, "We have seen PFI being associated with the CAA protest and in Gorukhuti in the Darrang incident."

A senior Assam Police officer said that the police have so far arrested 43 PFI and six Campus Front of India (CFI) cadres. "These PFI leaders were arrested as there is reliable information that they were making all out efforts to foment communal strife in Assam," the police officer said, refusing to be named.

He said, "They were indulging in whipping up communal passions and sentiments of the religious minority by criticizing every policy of the government with communal overtones which include the CAA, NRC (National Register of Citizens) and D-Voter (doubtful voter issue), the New Education Policy, Assam's Cattle Protection Act, Teachers' Eligibility Test examinations."

Giving details, the Assam Police official said that the PFI leaders had been extensively using cyber space to provoke the people to defy the government and to divide society on religious lines and obstruct the government in the execution of its policies. The PFI leaders, according to the police official, are organizing protests on such issues in very communally sensitive areas like Badarpur, Karimganj, Barpeta, Baksa, Kamrup (Rural), Goalpara and Kamrup (Metro) districts. (IANS)

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