SC status to East Bengali refugees: 3 elections, 3 promises, will it finally happen?

BENGALURU: Their demand to be recognised as a Scheduled Caste (SC) had been falling on deaf ears for decades; but the refugees from East Bengal (Bangladesh) settled in Raichur had their hopes up for the 1st time in December 2012 – just before the 2013 assembly elections – when the then-chief minister Jagadish Shettar took up their issue and decided to form a committee.
The proposed committee was eventually formed in March 2013 under the chairmanship of the additional chief secretary. The committee held multiple meetings and found merit in granting such a status to the refugees, many of whom now have Indian citizenship. There are around 24,854 refugees (1,864 families) residing in five rehabilitation camps in the Sindhanur taluk of Raichur district in North Karnataka. All of these are hindu families that had been rehabilitated after the 1971 war.
Subsequent to Shettar setting up the committee; Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who was touring the state ahead of the 2014 Parliamentary elections, met members of the camps and promised them that his government would ensure SC status for them. He had met them in Maski village from the neighbouring Lingasugur taluk.
“...Whether you vote for us or not, whether you do anything in favour of our government or not, I promise that your case will be taken up and you will be granted a scheduled caste status,” the refugees had been told by Siddaramaiah; as related by Prasen Raptan, a 40 year old refugee who is leading the fight for a SC status for his people.
“He was at Maski for a function, but soon after he alighted from the helicopter, he came straight to us (stationed at one corner of the ground) and did not go to the dais. He spoke with us for 15 minutes. Our hopes went up again, but for months there was no movement of files. The committee gave a positive report but no action was being initiated. When we went to meet him at his residence, he came into the room and spoke to other groups waiting for him, but didn’t acknowledge us even as our MLA tried garnering his attention,” Raptan said.
Jagadish Bawali, in his sixties and among the first batch of people to shift from erstwhile East Bengal, says that the people have been fighting for over 40 years and anything is yet to happen. “Politicians come and say things, but then forget. Hopefully, this time it happens,” he said.
Raptan argues that the votes of the refugee community from East Bengal have been the deciding factor for the winning candidates in both the MLA and MP elections, and that political parties have tried exploiting that for too long. However, on May 17, the Siddaramaiah-chaired cabinet cleared the proposal to grant them SC status—finally living up to the chief minister’s promise.
“...The elections are still so far away, and this has not been done keeping that in mind,” a senior official from the Chief Minister’s Office said. When asked whether the proposal has been sent to the Center for approval, he said that social welfare department is handling the issue.
P Manivannan, Secretary, Social Welfare Department confirmed to TOI that the file has been sent to the Government of India. “Now, everything depends on what the Centre says,” another official said.