Toll in police firing on anti-Citizenship Act protesters in Assam rises to 4

The two men who died over the weekend were among 27 injured protesters who were admitted to the Guwahati Medical College and Hospital (GMCH).

The toll in Thursday’s police firing in Assam on protesters against the Citizenship Act rose to four with two more succumbing to their injuries at the Guwahati Medical College and Hospital (GMCH).

A security patrol in Guwahati which was rocked by protests against the Citizenship Act on Thursday.(PTI)

“Two more people died people died of injuries in the hospital on Saturday and Sunday. Ishwar Nayak and Abdul Alim were injured in the firing,” said Ramen Talukdar, spokesperson of GMCH.

The two men were among 27 injured protesters who were admitted to the GMCH. Police claimed that some of the injured had been hit by rubber bullets. On Sunday, authorities relaxed curfew in Guwahati and parts of Dibrugarh district for several hours.

On Saturday, a truck driver died in central Assam’s Sonitpur district after rampaging protesters set his vehicle on fire.

The Assam government had deployed police, paramilitary forces and the army as well as protests broke out in many parts of Assam and North-East following the passage of Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2019 in Parliament on Wednesday and took a violent turn on Thursday after President Ram Nath Kovind signed it into law.

Chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal’s government also carried out an extensive reshuffle of the police force to clamp down on the protests.

The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, seeks to grant Indian citizenship to refugees from Hindu, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist and Parsi communities fleeing religious persecution from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh and who entered India on or before December 31, 2014.

The protests across the length of the state and forced the cancellation of a summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe that was scheduled to be held in Guwahati.

On Friday, the powerful All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the amended Citizenship Act.