The Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) on Wednesday met Assam Governor Gulab Chand Kataria and sought his intervention to end the ruling BJP's "political vengeance" against the opposition leaders in the state. The Congress leaders met the Governor at the Raj Bhavan and handed him a memorandum alleging that the state's current administration, led by Himanta Biswa Sarma, was "strangulating" the democratic tradition of opposing parties constructively criticising the ruling party. They said that the state government was employing administrative machinery under various pretexts to "gag" any opposing voices and target the opposition leaders.
“The current government of Assam under Himanta Biswa Sarma is strangulating the democratic practice of constructive criticism of the government by the opposition parties by targeting the opposition leaders and trying to gag any voice against the government by using administrative machinery on some or other pretext. As harassment to opposition leaders in recent times, transfer of relatives and well-wishers without any reason, or calling of the relatives of various leaders by police are noticed,” the APCC said in the memorandum.
The delegation of Congress leaders, led by MLA and Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the assembly Debabrata Saikia, Barpeta Lok Sabha MP Abdul Khaleque and MLAs Wazed Ali Choudhury, Nurul Huda, Jakir Hussain Sikdar, Abdus Sobahan Ali Sarkar, Nandita Das, Abdul Batin Khandakar and Asif Md. Nazar submitted the memorandum.
“The success of democracy depends to a great extent on the constructive role of the opposition parties. The opposition parties check the autocratic tendencies of the ruling party. It critically examines the rules and policies of the government and raises its voice on wrong policies. The main duty of the opposition party is to criticise the policies of the government. Therefore, in democracy, the opposition must be given space to make the government responsible and accountable to the public,” the memorandum read.
“Section 66-A of the Information Technology Act has been used on several occasions to prosecute people for legitimately exercising their right to free speech online. The Supreme Court in a historic judgment ruled that Section 66-A of the Information Technology Act has “unconstitutionally vague” and overload, and “arbitrarily, excessively and disproportionately invades the right of free speech,” the memorandum further read.
Urging the governor to take action to ensure that the Constitution's democratic ideals are maintained, the team requested an environment where the opposition parties may freely carry out their democratic duties.