Shillong Nov 19: The Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (KHADC) has passed a resolution urging the Centre to exempt the applicability of the Citizenship Amendment Bill from tribal areas and the whole state of Meghalaya.

Similarly, BJP legislator, Sanbor Shullai urged the President, Ram Nath Kovind to exempt Meghalaya from the purview of the CAB based on provisions of Article 244 of the Constitution.

The resolution was moved by executive member in-charge land, T. Chyne on the first day of its winter session and it was supported by all members including the opposition Congress.

Shullai who met the Governor, Tathagata Roy at the Raj Bhavan on Tuesday evening, submitted a memorandum to the President through the Governor

“Foreigners managed to enter illegally even without the CAB, and if the CAB becomes a law, foreigners will enter legally,” Chief Executive Member, Teiñwell Dkhar said.

Executive member, Paul Lyngdoh said that Delhi cannot do whatever it wished to, by using brute majority.

“However if Delhi does, then its attitude will not be different from the then imperial attitude that this country had opposed and fought against the British rule,” Lyngdoh said.

Lyngdoh also warned, “if the Union government wants to trample upon our rights and agreements signed by chiefs of our then Khasi states to be part of the Indian union, then we also have the right to revisit our relations.”

Meanwhile the BJP MLA stressed the need to exempt Meghalaya from the CAB under the special provision of Article 244 under paragraph 12A (b) of the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution, which states that the President may with respect to any act of Parliament, by notification, direct that it shall not apply to an autonomous district or an autonomous region in the state of Meghalaya.

He also said that scheduled area can be exempted on the basis of reservation of such state under the provision of the 95th amendment act 2009 which provides the entire Meghalaya under the reservation of scheduled tribe as both Lok Sabha seats in Meghalaya are reserved for Scheduled Tribes.

“The migration of people in like Pakistan and Afghanistan was mostly due to religious persecution. However the issue concerning illegal immigrants from Bangladesh cannot be identified on the basis of religion as there is large scale influx of in search of jobs rather than religious persecution which is the prime motive for granting of citizenship as stated in the CAB. The bill may be misused for granting of citizenship as it is difficult to identity people in the name of religion,” Shullai added.

Shullai also said that people and several organizations in the Northeast have opposed the bill as it will nullify the provisions of the Assam Accord of 1985 which fixed March 24, 1971 as the cut-off date for deportation of all illegal immigrants irrespective of religion.

Stating the modified version proposed to tweak the CAB so that it will not override the Bengal Eastern Frontier regulation of 1873 under which Indian nationals have to take the inner line permit to enter into Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram, the BJP MLA said that ILP can be also introduced in the entire Northeast to solve the problem of influx in all these states.

The BJP legislator further said that Indian citizenship should not be granted to any foreigner without the consent of the state.