Silchar: The Citizens Rights Protection Co-Ordination Committee, along with other organisations, staged a demonstration here seeking fulfilment of its demands on Friday. The demands are inclusion of the names of all the citizens of Barak Valley in the National Register of Citizens and end to harassment in the name of family-tree verification, among others.

Tapodhir Bhattacharjee, the committee's chairman and former vice-chancellor of Assam University, said people of the valley need to raise their voices jointly for their rights.

He said the draft NRC, published on December 31 midnight, has apparently made the citizens' premonitions of not finding their names in the first list, true. The names of majority of the people of Barak Valley were not included in the draft NRC. "Where will the non-Assamese people go if Assam is only for Assamese people?" he asked.

He questioned the decision of the Supreme Court of keeping the NRC-related matters out of the purview of Right to Information (RTI).

Siyab Uddin, a member of the Barak Valley Humanity Foundation, said the movement is for everyone being targeted by elements propagating Assamese cultural aggression.

N. Rongmei, a member of the Naga Rongmei People's Front, demanded inclusion of the names of all the citizens of the valley.

Most of the speakers also suspected that the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016, is just a political stunt/fake promise of the BJP.

A meeting was held between Cachar deputy commissioner S. Lakshmanan and a team comprising some members of the organisations.

Sadhan Purkayastha, state secretary general of the Citizens Rights Protection Committee, told The Telegraph that they have demanded steps to resolve the matter.

Lakshmanan assured them that steps would be taken to conduct the inter-district family tree verification process in local areas, he said.

Karimganj North MLA Kamalakhya Dey Purkayastha said the family-tree verification should be conducted via door-to-door process.

Deputy Speaker Dilip Kumar Paul said the Centre would take the decision on the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 soon.