Guwahati: The Assam government on Thursday decided to exempt tribals, tea tribes, Morans, and Motoks from the two-child norm for government jobs.
Addressing a press conference after chairing a state cabinet meeting, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the decision was taken to keep these communities outside population control measures and safeguard them from the risk of extinction.
“The cabinet decided to exempt members of the tea tribes, Morans, Motok and Scheduled Tribes from the provision of restricting the number of children to two under the population policy. If we stick to the policy, these populations will lose their distinct identities and gradually become extinct in the next 50 years,” he said.
The Chief Minister in September 2021 announced that the state government would waive the two-child norm for SC, ST, and other traditional forest-dwelling communities regarding eligibility for government jobs.
Sarma noted that the Moran community’s population is currently estimated at around 1 lakh.
“We consulted various social scientists and decided to relax the two-child norm; otherwise, these micro-communities may not survive,” he said.”
Under the Assam Public Services (Application of Small Family Norms in Direct Recruitment) Rules, 2019, the two-child policy came into effect in January 2021.
The state also enforces a two-child norm, along with minimum educational qualifications and functional sanitary toilet requirements, for candidates contesting panchayat elections, as per a 2018 amendment to the Assam Panchayat Act, 1994.
The chief minister had earlier stated that his government would gradually implement the two-child policy for availing benefits under certain state welfare schemes.
On other cabinet decisions, Sarma said the government will table the Tiwari Commission Report on the 1983 Nellie massacre in the next assembly session in November.
“The report had not been tabled earlier because the copy with the Assam government lacked the signature of the commission’s chairman. We were unsure whether the copy we possessed was authentic, so we interviewed officials involved at the time and sent the document for forensic verification,’ he explained.
During the Assam Agitation from 1979 to 1985, which protested illegal infiltration into the state, over 2,100 people—mostly Muslims—were killed in a single night in the Nellie massacre, which took place in present-day Morigaon district.
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The Chief Minister also announced that a new bill would be introduced in the upcoming assembly session to grant land rights to tea tribe communities.
