Shillong, Dec 11: The North East Students’ Organization (NESO) on Wednesday termed the passing of the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2019 in the Rajya Sabha a “black day” for the indigenous people of the North Eastern region.

“NESO termed this day the 11th December on which the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2019 was finally passed by the Rajya Sabha as a Black Day for the Indigenous peoples of the North East,” NESO chairman Samuel B Jyrwa said in a statement issued on Wednesday.

He said the approval of this contentious CAB by the Union Cabinet on the December 4, the passage of this Bill in the Lok Sabha on the December 9 and finally the passage in Rajya Sabha on December 11 is spelling a bleak future for the indigenous people of the North East.

According to him, this is another political injustice perpetrated by the Government of India on the microscopic indigenous communities of the region.

“NESO condemns the sinister ploy of the Government of India to reduce the indigenous people of the North East to a minority in their own land by rewarding the illegal infiltrators from Bangladesh who belong to the religious denomination of Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Parsis, Buddhist or Christians who have illegally entered North East by granting them Indian citizenship,” Jyrwa said.

He said the government instead of detaining and deporting these illegal infiltrators from our land is granting them Indian Citizenship.

“This will only encourage more infiltration from Bangladesh in which the North East shares a long border of about 1,741km,” Jyrwa added.