Brisk, smokey, savory and rich. This, alongside its high caffeine content, makes Assam tea the drink of choice for many a morning tea drinker. Sold separately or blended to produce alternate flavors such as Earl Grey or English breakfast, 50% of tea production in India is “Assam”, originating in its namesake state.[1] The industry here is old, dating back 172 years with the East India Company’s (EIC) “discovery” of tea plants in the upper Brahmaputra Valley.[2] Although the tea industry continues to prosper, there is another, less frequently related, story from the years of the EIC rule: the question of identity, belonging and citizenship. When the British made their “discovery” of tea plants in the Brahmaputra Valley they also stumbled across people. These people were called “Assamese”, and there was little discussion of characteristics or definition beyond this signifier.[3] However, in a region defined by migration, religion and above all its diversity, this simplistic definition would be the cause of much tension. Although the current Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) proclaims himself as the leader of “the mother of democracy”, valuing his country’s diversity, he has yet to be held accountable for the numerous incidents of horrific and large-scale violence against India’s Muslim population.[4] Using Assam as a testing ground, Modi has continued the colonial project of defining the Assamese through a manipulation of historical fact and discriminatory legislation designed to single out and disenfranchise Muslims. The millions of US dollars invested in Assam’s ethnic project are only the beginning of what may soon sweep the rest of the country with the large-scale rollout of the National Register of Citizens (NRC).
The complicated colonial past of Assam has allowed for the creation of many different imagined communities within the state. The 1873 Eastern Frontier Regulation began drawing distinctions between who would be included in the British Empire, as well as who would be excluded as they were considered too backward to civilize.[5] Events of the coming years would lead to much displacement, as the first partition of Bengal in 1905 united Assam with what became East Bengal. The land was also populated to source labor for tea plantations, often through forced migration of peoples over the country, thereby further diversifying this area.[6]
Following the violent partition of the sub-continent in 1947, unrest in East Pakistan (which bordered Assam) culminated in civil war and the creation of Bangladesh in 1971.[7] This led to a significant inflow of refugees into that state.[8] Demographically, Assam is now 35% Muslim, a population of roughly 12 million.[9] Beyond this, another set of identifiers are being applied: ‘immigrant’ or ‘indigenous’. To be considered an indigenous Assamese Muslim your ancestors must have arrived in the area when it was British in the 1800s, but if they came during the period after Bangladesh’s 1971 Independence you become an immigrant.[10] These arbitrary rules about who is or is not considered a true citizen have become the basis for the National Register of Citizens, a piece of legislation piloted in Assam and in which the Government of India has already invested 171 million USD.[11]
The NRC was created to weed out illegal Bangladeshi migrants, but in practice it has been used for much more insidious purposes. An individual is required to prove that they are in fact Indian, by providing documentation of ancestry dating back further than fifty years, otherwise they will be forced to leave the country.[12] Targeting many working-class Assamese, this law has forced some to spend their entire life savings attempting to acquire documentation, and others to take their own lives so they do not end up among the more than two million who have been rendered stateless.[13] However, this registry does not target everyone equally. To quote Modi himself, “Hindus can never be foreigners”.[14] As a result, the targets[15] of these rulings are “suspected Bengali illegal migrants” essentially code to refer to Indian Muslims[16].
The production of the first NRC in Assam led to an uncomfortable discovery for those administering it. Many illegal immigrants were in fact Bengali Hindus and not Muslims.[17] This finding was promptly rejected by the BJP and followed up by another piece of legislation, the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which provided that undocumented Hindu’s could easily acquire citizenship, and extended this privilege to other religious minorities across Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan.[18] The intent of this amendment was to provide citizenship to anyone not Muslim and give more power to the Foreigners Tribunals allowing them to determine a person’s nationality, and as a result status in the country. Prime Minister Modi has been previously quoted stating that “people creating violence can be identified by their clothes”, and it appears this has now become a criterion for determining citizenship.[19]
The BJP government has characterized Indian Muslims as responsible for many of the country’s problems, comparing the illegal immigrants to termites “eating the country”, and utilizing all welfare resources.[20] They have become introduced into discourse as “the Muslim problem”, or even “the minority taking over”, an oxymoron in itself, and somewhat ironic, since Muslim existence in the country has become increasingly difficult.[21] Unchecked anti-Muslim violence that has slipped under the radar of law enforcement (or even allegedly induced by them as in the Delhi riots[22]) is now becoming further provoked and justified in immigration and deportation laws such as the NRC and CAA[23]. What is happening in Assam might soon engulf the rest of India.
From tea plantations and exports to a haven for refugees fleeing conflict, Assam’s rich and diverse history is to be celebrated and embraced. Instead of allowing it to thrive as a pluralistic society the Indian government has poured immense resources to homogenize its population through disenfranchisement. Through fearmongering and extending the colonial project, the NRC and CAA have robbed large numbers of Indian Muslims of their homes, families, and livelihoods.
Maliha Sarwar is a third year student pursuing a double major in History and Sociocultural Anthropology. Her research interests include post-colonial nation building as well as diaspora and migration. She is excited to have the opportunity to contribute to the South Asian section of Synergy this year to start conversations on issues she is passionate about, and explore her own South Asian heritage.India’s National Register of Citizens: A Tool for Muslim Disenfranchisement
Bibliography
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“About Tea Industries.” Government Of Assam, India. Government of Assam Industries & Commerce. Accessed November 6, 2021. https://industries.assam.gov.in/portlet-innerpage/about-tea-industries.
Bhattacharjee, Manash Firaq. “We Foreigners: What It Means to Be Bengali in India’s Assam.” Al Jazeera, February 26, 2020. https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2020/2/26/we-foreigners-what-it-means-to-be-bengali-in-indias-assam.
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[1] “Industrial Statistics,” Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Government of Assam, India, Accessed 2021.
[2] “About Tea Industries,” Government Of Assam, India, Government of Assam Industries & Commerce. Accessed November 6, 2021.
[3] “Yasmin Saikia, “Muslim Belonging in Assam: History, Politics, and the Future,” South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 44, no. 5 (August 15, 2021): 876.”
[4] Suhasini Haidar, ‘India Is the Mother of All Democracies’, Says Modi at U.N. General Assembly, The Hindu, September 26, 2021.
[5] Navine Murshid, “Assam and the Foreigner Within,” Asian Survey 56, no. 3 (2016): 584,
[6] Murshid, Assam and the Foreigner Within, 589
[7] Debasish Roy Chowdhury, “Is India Headed for an Anti-Muslim Genocide?” Time, October 4, 2021,
[8] Chowdhury, Is India Headed for an Anti-Muslim Genocide?
[9] Saikia, Muslim Belonging in Assam, 873
[10] Murshid, Assam and the Foreigner Within, 34
[11] Jayshree Bajoria, ‘Shoot the Traitors’: Discrimination Against Muslims under India’s New Citizenship Policy,” Edited by Meenakshi Ganguly, Human Rights Watch, June 16, 2020, 23.
[12] Jayshree, ‘Shoot the Traitors’, 50
[13]Siddharth Deb, “’They Are Manufacturing Foreigners’: How India Disenfranchises Muslims”,The New York Times, September 15, 2021.
[14] Jayshree, ‘Shoot the Traitors’, 25
[15]Manash Firaq Bhattacharjee, “We Foreigners: What It Means to Be Bengali in India’s Assam,” Al Jazeera, February 26, 2020.
[16] Chowdhury, Is India Headed for an Anti-Muslim Genocide?
[17] Saikia, Muslim Belonging in Assam, 870
[18] Ministry of Law and Justice, “The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019,” The Gazette of India, December 12, 2019.
[19] Chowdhury, Is India Headed for an Anti-Muslim Genocide?
[20] Devjyot Ghoshal, “Amit Shah Vows to Throw Illegal Immigrants into Bay of Bengal,” Reuters, April 12, 2019.
[21] Saikia, Muslim Belonging in Assam, 872
[22] Yogita Limaye, “Delhi 2020 Religious Riots: Amnesty International Accuses Police of Rights Abuses,” BBC News, August 27, 2020.
[23]Sudha Ramachandran, “Hindutva Violence in India: Trends and Implications,” Counter Terrorist Trends and Analyses 12, no. 4 (June 1, 2020).