I Am Really Scared: Hindu Bengali Refugees Excluded From NRC List

Hindu Bengali refugees whose names were excluded from the final list are worried about their future in India.

Hindu Bengali refugees left out of the final NRC list

(Photo: The Quint)

Video Editor: Vishal Kumar

Many among the 19 lakh people who have been left out of the final NRC list are Hindu Bengali refugees. They claim to have come to India from East Pakistan in the 60s, which is well before the NRC cut-off date of 1971. And yet, they didn't make it to the Assam NRC.

One such Hindu Bengali refugee is Shyamapada Chakravarty. He, his wife and their two daughters did not make it to the list. They came to India as a result of “atrocities in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh)” and have lived in India as a Permanent Liability.

Chakravarty says that at the time of their migration, then PM Jawaharlal Nehru invited Hindus from erstwhile East Pakistan and offered them shelter. He adds that all their documents are “legitimate”.

However, the ‘Bangladeshi’ tag was never dissociated from them.

“The locals (Assamese community) want us to go back to Bangladesh. We came from East Pakistan. Bangladesh was formed in 1971. Still, we are called Bangladeshi.”

Shyamapada Chakravarty, a Hindu Bengali refugee

‘I’m Really Scared’

Ratna Chakravarty, Shyamapada’s wife, says that she is terrified, especially because she “doesn’t have the money to fight the case for inclusion”. The family is more worried about their children because with their names not being on the list, they believe their children’s future looks bleak.

Dino Krishno Das, another Hindu Bengali refugee, who works as a trader in the weekly market, fell sick as a result of constantly worrying about his future post the exclusion of his name the final list.

“I am always thinking about the NRC.” he said.

BJP leader and Assam minister Himanta Biswa Sharma said that the party will stand by legal Hindu migrants and will pursue their cases so that they can later extradite the illegal ones. He further added that “technical flaws” may have caused the exclusion of Hindu Bengali refugees and told The Hindu that the state government would move the Supreme Court for a re-verification process.