Nagaon: Hundreds of people, led by the AJYCP, carried out a symbolic cremation of railway minister of state Rajen Gohain for his controversial statement on the National Register of Citizens and the citizenship amendment bill.

Gohain, the Nagaon MP, had told reporters here on Thursday that NRC is dangerous for the people of the state and could cause a threat to the existence of Assamese. As a BJP MP, he advocates the citizenship amendment bill, which is opposed in the Brahmaputra Valley.

Jiten firm on stand

Assam police recorded Ulfa leader Jiten Dutta's statement on Friday, a day they slapped sedition charges and registered a suo moto case against him at Digboi police station in Tinsukia district.

Slogans of " Jati Nayak hai hai, chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal murdabad, BJP hai hai, BJP murdabad" filled the air as the clock ticked 11 in the morning. More than five hundred local people, mostly youths, gathered outside the police station as Dutta came from his Digboi residence in a two-vehicle convoy.

Sonowal had earned the title of Jati Nayak in 2005 when, acting on his petition, the Supreme Court had scrapped the Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunal) Act, 1983.

Digboi police station officer-in-charge Mahesh Bora said the police recorded Dutta's statement and let him go on the condition that he must appear before the police whenever required.

Speaking to reporters as he walked out of Digboi police station, Dutta reiterated his stand of withdrawing from ceasefire and taking up arms, if the situation so demands, if the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016, is passed.

JPC ends visit: The Joint Parliamentary Committee on Bill to amend the Citizenship Act, 1955, on Friday said it will be meeting again to discuss the issue. "We will go back to New Delhi where the committee will sit again and decide on further visits because there is an approved proposal for visiting Bengal and Tripura," JPC member and Assam MP Bhubaneswar Kalita said after the team's meeting with government officials in Shillong on Friday.

The JPC ended its two-day visit to the city on Friday.

Additional reporting by Rishu Kalantri in Tinsukia and Banbitlang Marbaniang in Shillong