Students of the Bodoland University take part in a protest against the Assam cabinet's approval of a report on granting ST status to six communities of the state, in Kokrajhar, Assam, Saturday, Nov. 29, 2025. Students on Saturday stormed the assembly hall of the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) Secretariat and allegedly vandalised properties during the protest.
Credit: PTI
Guwahati: The imbroglio over Assam government's proposal to grant Scheduled Tribe (ST) status to six more ethnic communities, a pre-poll promise of ruling BJP, remains far from over with a meeting convened on Thursday here remaining short of breaking the deadlock.
A delegation of the Co-ordination Committee of the Tribal Organisations in Assam (CCTOA), a forum of 26 tribal organisations, which met Assam Minister Ranoj Kumar Pegu on Thursday demanded a tripartite meeting in the presence of Home Minister Amit Shah and Chief Minister Himanta Biswa to find an "amicable solution" to the issue.
Pegu heads the Group of Ministers (GoM), which had prepared the proposal for granting ST status to Tai Ahom, Moran, Motok, Chutia, Koch Rajbongshi and tea tribes in three categories, ST (Hills), ST (Plains) and ST (Valley).
The CCTOA, which represents the existing 14 ST communities, are opposed to the proposal saying the same would infringe on the reservations and other benefits they are getting at present. "Athough the government wants to create a new category of STs as ST (Valley) for the Tai Ahoms and others, at the national level, particularly in the UPSC examinations, there is no differentiation. All are considered as STs for reservations. That means the present and the new STs would compete for the same amount of reservations. Today, in the meeting we submitted a draft demand to clear doubts over this to ensure that the existing STs are not affected in anyway," chief convenor of CCTOA, Aditya Khakhlari, said after the meeting.
They also demanded clear criteria for identification of the communities to be included as STs. "So we requested the government to have a tripartite meeting in the presence of Home Minister Amit Shah and CM Himanta Biswa Sarma as the Centre can take steps to remove the bottlenecks," he said.
The meeting came after parts of Assam witnessed massive protests, including vandalism in Bodoland Territorial Region, as the GoM tabled the report in the Assembly last week. The CCTOA, however, said they postponed their agitation for one month for finding a solution through talks.
ST dilemma for BJP
The issue of ST status for six communities, in fact, has become a worry for BJP in the run up to Assembly elections slated early next year. While the six communities have stepped up agitation demanding that BJP must fulfll the promise it made before the elections in the past, the existing STs are also on the streets opposing the GoM move. The indigenous communities in Assam have been BJP's vote bank.