I read with great interest Sanjib Baruah's article "The Partition's Long Shadow..." in the December 2009 issue of Citizenship Studies. I learnt a lot. Thanks to Chandan-da for forwarding it.
I found particularly useful Sanjib's approach of studying the issue by explicitly contrasting the historically "pan-Indian" and the "local" (or indigenous) frames of looking at it. Perhaps, there are other frames that are relevant; among them the immigrants' frame. To the extent our collective actions are shaped by the stories we tell ourselves, the last one may also have played and will play an important role in determining the historical process in Assam. At the conclusion of his article, Sanjib argues for: "a multi-level and transnational citizenship regime that decouples citizenship from nationality. Voting right in Bangladesh could be combined with full rights of personhood in India....While some rights could be universal, others could remain tied to nationality. Resident and migratory foreigners could have the former, but not the latter. Some version of transnational multi-level citzenship regime might be Assam's last hope..." Independent of the theoretical and symbolic merits of such a scheme, I am rather concerned that a society that cannot maintain a simple dual distinction between citizens and non-citizens is unlikely to be able to maintain a multi-level system of boundaries within its populace. Distinctions require exclusion for the different segments - exclusion from public goods, exclusion from political rights, exclusion from the right to earn political rent by seeking political and other government offices. Exclusion requires enforcement and voluntary compliance. If I am not mistaken, there is a hint in Sanjib's article that such a system may be implementable because the people themselves will be more willing to comply (he also suggests that cooperation from foreign governments might be helpul). For instance (and this is an old argument), if there was a category of temporary guest workers that were given the right to work and live without right to vote (and a few other such rights), some illegal immigrants would be more willing to register themselves legitimately under this category (and visit their families across the border freely), rather than claim to be citizens (knowing that it is an unlawful claim that could land them in jeopardy and that effectively prevents them from moving freely). However, this will not work if there is no penalty associated with claiming full citizenship in an unlawful manner. Finally, I wonder whether the legalistic view that the ultimate legitimate destiny for illegal immigrants is return to their source country occupies our minds excessively. Perhaps, we should think more seriously about creating incentives for immigrants to move to rest of India where the pan-Indian narrative (that has hurt the north east in the past) will provide them with greater legitimacy. And so whether or not we like them, the anti-immigrant movements in Assam and other conflicts, the relative decline of economic opportunities in Assam and other changes (such as the defeat of Hindutva politics by caste based and other forces in mainland India) may be serving a historical purpose. Perhaps, we should think about small institutional changes that harness the process and encourage it without enticing hostile closing of doors by neighboring regions in India. Paradoxically, the more open the pan-Indian rhetoric towards immigrants from the subcontinent, lower their enforcement of citizenship and the greater the incentive for the marginal migrants to move out of Assam. The journey may well continue for some of them. Santanu. -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Chan Mahanta Sent: Friday, August 27, 2010 1:07 PM To: A Mailing list for people interested in Assam from around the world Subject: Re: [Assam] An article on Assam Here it is Mayur: _______________________________________________ assam mailing list [email protected] http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org
