Barak Democratic Front (BDF) censures BJP MLAs of Barak for opposing associate official language status to Bengali in Assam

The proposal to designate Bengali as an associate official language of Assam has sparked controversy in Assam, with Bengali MLAs of Barak Valley protesting vehemently against the proposal. The North Karimganj MLA Kamalakhya Dey Purkayastha had recently requested the Assam government to recognise Bengali as an associate official language of the state, but the Bengali MLAs of the region opposed the proposal in the Assembly, which has stunned the people of the region.

The Chief Convenor of the Barak Democratic Front (BDF), Pradip Dutta Roy, has called the opposition to Kamalakhya’s proposal by the Bengali MLAs “extremely reprehensible” and urged the people of Barak Valley to label them as traitors. Roy highlighted that Bengali is spoken by 30% of the population in Assam, and hence there should not be any issue in designating it as an associate official language of the state. Roy also pointed out that the government has recognised the Bodo language martyrs and given them monetary aid alongwith the martyrs of Assam agitation, but the Bengali language martyrs of 1961 have not been given official recognition, let alone monetary aid.

Roy also criticised the state government for halting the proposal to recognise Bhasa Sohid Station Silchar despite getting green signal from the Railways under Central Government to do so. He has accused the Assam Government and BJP of being anti-Bengali working against their interests. He questioned where were the MLAs attacking Kamalakhya when out of 40,000 state government jobs only 107 people from Barak Valley got them.