Itanagar, Oct 18 (TIWN) The Chakma Development Foundation of India (CDFI) on Monday urged the Arunachal Pradesh government to stop racial profiling of Chakmas in the state, claiming that "conducting of Census of only the Chakma tribal community in the state is illegal and unconstitutional".

“Out of hundreds of communities, you cannot just pick one community for your political gains. Even if you look at it, they are so disingenuous, they are not conducting a census among Hajongs. This vilification of particular communities for political purposes, wherever it happens, be it in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, this has to stop,” said Suhas Chakma, firmly standing his ground.  Officials of the Arunachal Pradesh government have been conducting a census of Chakmas under Changlang district, informed the CDFI founder. 

The Additional Deputy Commissioner of Bordumsa, Changlang district, had reportedly written a letter to the Village Headmen of Bijoypur I, II and III under Bordumsa Sub Division of Changlang district on October 1 to submit a ‘self-declared’ population detail of their respective villages with original and migrated settlers in the specimen format and prepare a consolidated data of all Chakmas residing in Bordumsa Division. 

“Conducting a census of only the Chakmas is nothing but an act of racial profiling in clear violation of Article 14 of the Constitution of India and International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination ratified by India,” Suhas Chakma further stated.  The organisation reiterated that the Chakmas of Arunachal Pradesh are citizens of India, even though due to the discriminatory policies and practices of the Arunachal Pradesh government, their citizenship applications have not been processed in the last 25 years in contempt of the Supreme Court judgments while those who are citizens by birth under the Citizenship Act, 1955 are not included into the electoral rolls.