Withdraw Disturbed Areas Act, AFSPA from entire state: Assam to Centre

The Assam Cabinet has made a recommendation to the Centre to withdraw the Disturbed Areas Act and Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) from the entire state, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Friday.

Earlier, Assam CM Sarma on Monday met Union Home Minister Amit Shah in the national capital and pleaded for the complete withdrawal of the AFSPA from the state.

In the course of the meeting that lasted for 30 minutes, Chief Minister Sarma and Union Home Minister Shah discussed threadbare the roadmap for the complete withdrawal of AFSPA from Assam, as per the Assam government release.

The Chief Minister cited the significant improvement in the law and order situation, the surrendering of scores of underground cadres of extremist outfits with huge caches of arms and ammunition following the signing of several peace accords and the drastic fall in deaths of security personnel and civilians as reasons for the complete lifting of AFSPA from Assam.

It may be noted that the 'Disturbed Area' notification has been in force since 1990 in the whole of Assam. On April 1, 2022, the AFSPA was removed from the entire State of Assam except for nine districts, including one subdivision of another district.

From April 1, the districts under the AFSPA in Assam were further reduced to eight as the Act was withdrawn from the Lakhipur subdivision of Cachar district.

The law empowers the Armed Forces and the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) deployed in "Disturbed Areas" to arrest a person without a warrant and enter or search premises without a warrant along with some other actions.