Elections to the 126-member Assembly in Assam saw a vociferous campaign from the Bharatiya Janata Party , which hopes to retain power in th...
Elections to the 126-member Assembly in Assam saw a vociferous campaign from the Bharatiya Janata Party, which hopes to retain power in the state. The votes will be counted on May 2 for the state Assembly, whose majority mark is 64.
The saffron party is in alliance in the state with Asom Gana Parishad and the United People’s Party Liberal. The Congress-All India United Democratic Front-Left combine, however, held its own and pushed back with anti-Citizenship Act rhetoric.
The three-phased elections – held on March 27, April 1 and April 6 – saw over 73% voter turnout on the first day, and 79.97% and 80.96% on second and third days. The polling had some stray incidents of violence, amid the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.
This was also the first election after the fierce protests against the new citizenship law across the country, which first began in Assam. But the reason for the demonstrations in the state were entirely different from the rest of the country.
The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, notified in 2019, made undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan eligible for Indian citizenship. Across the country, protests broke out against the law, seen as an assault on secular values inscribed in the Constitution.
In Assam, and other states of the North...
