A joint meeting of influential NGOs-- Young Mizo Association (YMA), Mizo Hmeichhe Insuihkhawm Pawl (MHIP) or Mizo women organisation, and Mizo Zirlai Pawl (MZP) or Mizo Students Association-- at the central YMA office here today decided to submit a memorandum to the Home minister who is to visit Mizoram to oversee the ongoing repatriation of Bru refugees from Tripura.
'' We will ask the minister to give rehabilitation to more than 80 Mizo families who were driven out from Sakhan hill range of Tripura by Bru militants in 1998,'' said Lalmuanpuia Punte, representative of MZP.
The memorandum demands to stop the ongoing Bru repatriation if rehabilitation is not given to the displaced Mizos.
'' If the government can help the Brus, there is no reason to neglect the Mizo families who have been displaced by the Brus,'' he said.
The Bru militants drove away the Mizo families from their land in 1998, a year after the Brus left Mizoram for Tripura following ethnic violence with Mizos. Most of the Mizos fled home following threat and sought shelter with other Mizo families living in Jampui hills in Tripura and Mizoram.
The memorandum drafted today also demands a handsome ex-gratia to the next-of-kin of Johny Lalhmangaihzuala, 22, a Mizo student of Lovely Professional University in Punjab, who was killed by some Sudanese students during a football match on April 29.
Even though the Mizoram Upa Pawl of Mizoram senior citizens’ association could not send its representatives at the meeting, it extended support to the memorandum, the source said, adding that the joint meeting of NGOs would ask all political parties in Mizoram to sign the memorandum on Monday.
The meeting also agreed to conduct a joint verification of the Bru families who have already been repatriated to Mizoram to ensure if each and every one of them is a bonafide citizen of Mizoram.
The NGOs are of opinion that there were chances of Brus from neighbouring states, including Bangladesh, joining their brethren in the refugee camps to get the opportunity to migrate to Mizoram during the repatriation, therefore insisted that the 1995 electoral roll be reviewed.