Bengal woman made to leave Assam after NRC plea rejected
Times of India | 14 July 2025
Kolkata: A 52-year-old woman from Cooch Behar, who moved to Assam in 1991 after marrying a man from the state, has been forced to return after her plea to be included in NRC was rejected, Bengal migrant welfare board chairperson and Rajya Sabha MP Samirul Islam said on Sunday.
Arati Das said her father had been a Bengal govt schoolteacher since 1968 and she was born and raised in Cooch Behar. However, her plea — as well as that of her sister-in-law — to be included in NRC was rejected by the foreigners tribunal. "I was extremely depressed when I was first asked to leave Assam in 2019 or face consequences. But I have learnt to live with it," she told Trinamool netas, who visited her home and assured her of legal help.
Islam posted on X: "Ghosh, a 52-year-old woman and permanent resident of Jhaukuti village in Cooch Behar's Boxirhat, belongs to a family that has lived there for generations. The only ‘fault' of the Ghosh family was marrying their daughter into a family in Assam. The anti-Bengali Assam govt then labelled Arati a foreigner or infiltrator and removed her name from the NRC list. As a result, she had to leave her ‘sasural' (in-laws' house) and return to Cooch Behar. Arati Ghosh is one of many examples of being harassed in Assam because their applications to include their names in the NRC were rejected.
"
State finance minister Chandrima Bhattacharya said: "She spent her life in Cooch Behar, with her parents, as an Indian citizen. She got married to an Assam resident... When they learnt that she was Bengali, they struck her name off the NRC (register). She is now living here in terror. Even her sister-in-law, who is in Alipurduar, has met the same fate. What is this crime being perpetrated against women? Is marrying an Assamese a crime in India? Will it lead to losing Indian citizenship?"