Silchar: The Cachar district committee of the SUCI (Communist) on Sunday held a protest at the base of the Khudiram Bose statue in Silchar. The protest was held against what the party described as a conspiracy to remove the names of Indian citizens from minority communities from the voter list in the name of the Special Revision process.

Party workers and supporters gathered at the spot around 12 noon. They raised slogans for nearly an hour. The slogans demanded that not a single Indian citizen’s name be deleted from the voter list in the name of Special Revision.

Protesters also called for an end to what they termed targeted harassment of minority citizens. They demanded legal action against those making false and baseless complaints and insisted that every Indian citizen’s name must be included in the voter list without discrimination.

The protesters alleged that false objections were being filed by misusing Form 7. They claimed that one complainant was being used to raise objections against hundreds of voters. In some cases, names were allegedly objected to without the knowledge of the persons concerned. They also alleged that even living persons were falsely shown as dead in complaints.

Addressing the gathering, Cachar district committee members Prabin Shyamdeo Kurmi, Subrata Chandra Nath, Professor Ajay Roy and Dulali Ganguly said there is widespread fear across the state over the Special Revision of the voter list. They alleged that a planned attempt is underway to delete the names of lakhs of genuine Indian citizens belonging to religious minority communities.

The speakers further alleged that the Chief Minister, while holding a constitutional post, had publicly stated that harassment of a particular community was being carried out on his instructions. They also referred to past experiences such as NRC, D-voter cases, Foreigners’ Tribunals, detention camps and evictions, which they said had led to harassment and denial of rights to genuine citizens.

The party demanded that the current objection disposal process be completely scrapped. They called for preparation of the revised voter list based on the previous voter list, ensuring inclusion of all genuine voters. They also demanded immediate rejection of baseless complaints and proper proof of appearance during hearings for the accused voters.

The speakers appealed to people from all communities, irrespective of caste, religion, language and creed, to unite and build a strong democratic movement. They urged citizens to compel the Election Commission and the government to stop what they described as a dangerous conspiracy.

Among others present at the protest were Nakul Ranjan Pal, Ramkumar Bagti, Khadeja Laskar and Kumud Sinha.

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