Ahluwalia failed to talk about identity and political security of Gorkhas in the Lok Sabha - BGP

PR, KalimNews, March 18, 2015: Praising Darjeeling MP SS Ahluwalia for referring some issues confronting the Gorkhas of India in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday during the debate on the Union Budget Bharatiya Gorkha Parisangh remarked his speech negatively for confining demand of Gorkhas to local development.

Appreciating for citing aspirations of the people of Darjeeling and Dooars and apprising the House about their economic and developmental problems by Ahluwalia, BGP stated that he rightly pointed out that West Bengal has treated the people of Darjeeling and Dooars as second-class citizens despite two agreements being signed to create the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council and the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration.

In a press release Bharatiya Gorkha Parisangh has pointed out that Ahluwalia diminished the entire subject of Gorkha aspirations for a separate state into an issue of local development. His speech referred to areas in his constituency like Chopra and Phansidewa and Sevoke Road and to matters of development like smart corridors and educational institutions and other benefits that were “promised during the formation of GTA”. 

BGP commented that Ahluwalia seems to clearly think that changing the economic status of Gorkhas of Darjeeling and Dooars would resolve all issues about which the Gorkhas of India have been agitating since 1907. The real truth behind the demand for Gorkhaland lies not in the economic status of the people of Darjeeling and Dooars, but in the insecurity that Gorkhas across India feel about their national identity and political existence, states the release. Resolving the economic issues raised by Ahluwalia in his speech would meet the problems only half-way, and that too only for the Gorkhas living in Darjeeling and Dooars, states the release.

The release signed by Rev Dr Enos Das Pradhan, National President of BGP has categorically criticized Ahluwalia's effort as a failure to enunciate the real issue, which is of the Gorkhas being discriminated as citizens politically, socially and economically in other states of India on the erroneous ground that they are foreigners from Nepal who have entered India under the provisions of the 1950 India-Nepal Treaty of Friendship. 

The release states, while he rightly recalled the contributions of Gorkhas in defending India, even eloquently quoting Lata Mangeshkar, he failed to tell the country and the members of Parliament that these very same Gorkhas are treated as foreigners in their own country. BGP mentioned that the foundation of the demand of Gorkhaland is the need to concretise the Indian identity of Gorkhas, not economic deprivation as made out by Ahluwalia in the Lok Sabha.

Criticising the request of the MP to the Speaker of the Lok Sabha to set up a committee to examine the long-pending demands of the region BGP has stated that the Central Government is well aware of all the nuances of the demand of the Gorkhas for a separate state, having been petitioned hundreds of times since 1907 so there is no need for any panel to evaluate the problems of Darjeeling and Dooars. Rather, what is emphatically needed is Parliament’s support in bringing a Bill under Article 3 of the Constitution for the creation of a new state and for the setting up a commission to determine the carving out of the Darjeeling-Dooars region from West Bengal to comprise a new state, states the release.

BGP has also urged Ahluwalia to take all steps to ensure that he represents the true sentiments of the Gorkhas and their demand in Parliament, keeping in mind that the biggest driver of his election from Darjeeling by a massive margin in 2014 was the hope that he would be an able spokesperson for the creation of a separate state of Gorkhaland, which is the only democratic measure that can resolve the identity and political insecurity of India’s Gorkhas.