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Silchar, Sept. 26: The All Barak Youth and Students’ Association imposed an indefinite blockade this morning on National Highway 54 near the Lailapur checkgate under Cachar district in protest against alleged harassment of non-Mizos in Mizoram.
The association’s convener, Baharul Islam Barabhuyan, alleged that Young Mizo Association members harassed people who went to work in the neighbouring state from the Assam plains and added that the members did not even honour the inner line permits carried by the people from Cachar to enter Mizoram for taking up temporary jobs there.
He alleged that a Mizoram-based organisation had even demolished a pillar demarcating the two states’ border in Cachar near Lailapur on September 11.
The situation in Mizoram, on the other hand, is tense.
The state’s government is expected to soon send an official note to its Assam counterpart drawing attention to the sudden spurt in human traffic from Cachar through the Lailapur checkgate, about 38km from here.
A senior official in Mizoram said the government was contemplating the move because the number of people entering the state through the gate had suddenly swollen from 200 a day to 400, creating concern in the state about being swamped by people from the Assam plains.
A Mizoram police intelligence source said the spurt was linked to the recent riots in Assam’s Bodo belt and the subsequent calls by various organisations here to detect and deport illegal Bangladeshi migrants.
The Young Mizo Association has already kicked off a movement similar to its Assam counterparts and has demanded weeding out of names of illegal Bangladeshi migrants from the state’s voter lists.
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