The Unpeople

Assam's electoral issues are many: eviction drives, razed lives and identity crises

- Ashlin Mathew IS SENIOR ASSOCIATE EDITOR, OUTLOOK. SHE IS BASED IN DELHI

MALEK Ali remembers how his life was erased. At 40, he had known no other home than Anandpur in Assam’s Golaghat district. He was born there and lived there all his life with his wife Nazmeena Begum and their two children, aged 12 and 10.

And then, in November 2025, his house was demolished. Soon after, his name vanished from the electoral rolls. “My name was there on the National Register of Citizens (NRC) list, and it was also there on the voters’ list until December 2025,” he says. In January, he insists, his name disappeared from the list.

No notice. No hearing. Police arrived, demanding he leave. “I was not even allowed to stay in the place where I was born,” Malek recounts. Now an imam in Palajuri, Laharighat Taluk, 250 km away, he sought restoration locally, asking, “Why are we treated this way? We are Indians too.”

He is not the only one. His haunting sentiment multiplies across lives, across districts, in a state where belonging is increasingly fraught with conditions. Multiple claims from various Muslim groups suggest that nearly several lakh Muslims in Assam are dubbed “Miya” and share this fate. 'Miya' is a derogatory term often used to refer to Muslims who are of Bengali origin, unlike the khilonjiya Muslims who have ethnic roots in the Assam region.

“This is my house,” says Shahbuddin Ali, his disbelief cutting through the dust as he stands among brick ruins that hold parts of his life. “I have been living here for more than 20 years. I have all the documents. We had bought the land. How can we be thrown out? How will we live?” He said, he belongs to Assam’s ethnic Muslim khilonjiya (sons of the soil) community, yet the distinction collapses under state action. His home was demolished on Saturday, March 14, 2026, a day before elections for the 126 seats in the state were announced.