Activists of non-Bodo organisations stage a protest in Guwahati. File picture

Bongaigaon, Sept. 22: The Oboro Suraksha Samiti, a non-Bodo group, will soon move the Supreme Court to get 684 villages, dominated by non-Bodos, excluded from the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC).

The Samiti was formed on March 11, 2012, to protect the interest of non-Bodo communities living in the BTAD, which covers the four districts of Kokrajhar, Baksa, Chirang and Udalguri. The Samiti comprises 23 non-Bodo organisations.

Samiti general secretary Dilwar Hussain told The Telegraph that its leaders have consulted a senior advocate of the apex court, Fakaruddin Ahmed, on September 14 to file a suit against the BTC administration challenging the “improper implementation” of the Sixth Schedule, “which is applicable only to hill tribes”, in the council area for the development of the plain tribes.

The BTAD comprises 3,082 villages, out of which 1,000 villages have Bodo population and the rest 2,082 are non-Bodo dominated.

“With such population pattern the formation of BTC under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution leaves merit for legal argument and on the basis of which we are going to approach the apex court,” Hussain said.

Several non-Bodo groups had been fighting separately to get 684 non-Bodo-dominated villages out of the BTAD since 2004. Now 23 such non-Bodo groups have joined the Samiti to take up the issue jointly under a single platform.

The Samiti took the issue of exclusion of non-Bodo villages to Gauhati High Court in 2012 and subsequently the court directed the chief secretary of Assam to submit a verification report on the issue within three months. However, the chief secretary had informed the high court that he was not authorised to do this particular task according to the Constitution when there is the governor, said Hussain.

Later when the court had asked the governor to play his role to resolve the issue in 2013, the governor was supposed to consult the chief minister of the state. “But the matter is still pending with the governor,” said Hussain.

In between, to assert their majority in the BTAD, some armed groups among the Bodos had allegedly started attacking, abducting, extorting and intimidating the non-Bodo communities residing there with the objective of expelling them from the Bodo belt, which had resulted into BTAD clashes in 2012 and in May this year, Hussain said.

“Therefore, the Samiti has finally decided to approach the Supreme Court to get the non-Bodo-dominated villages excluded from the BTC before elections next year,” he said.

The council that administers the BTAD and is a 46-member body, of whom 40 are elected by the people residing in the four districts. Election to the council is held every five years.