Agartala, Mar 12: Chairman of ruling Tipraha Indigenous Progressive Regional Alliance (TIPRA) of Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (ADC) and royal scion Pradyot Kishore Debbarman on Saturday reiterated his call for unity of indigenous people to achieve their constitutional right.

He was addressing the first mammoth rally of TIPRA at Vivekananda stadium here ever since it’s existence. Thousands of TIPRA supporters including a sizable non-tribals across the state attended the rally.

The rally was apparently more impressive in comparison to the recently held gathering for Union Home Minister Amit Shah and CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechuri and Politburo member Prakash Karat.

Pradyot criticized the ruling BJP and opposition CPI-M for misinterpreting the concept of ‘Greater Tipraland’ for which TIPRA has been fighting since beginning, beyond communal and community bias. The Greater Tipraland speaks of separate state to cover areas inhabitated by the State’s native tribe afar from geographical boundary of Tripura and the indigenous population have supported the demand and garnered the whole movement of TIPRA now, he stated.

“The ADC was set up under Sixth Schedule of Indian Constitution in the eighties but till date no government has allowed ADC to function as per the constitutional provisions and enjoy the autonomy laid down in the Act. Inadequate finance from the state government is the inherent problem of ADC and before every election, leaders of the national parties assure autonomy of ADC but they fail (to provide) after winning. We are fighting to achieve our constitutional right beyond all communal politics and ideology,” Pradyot underlined.

He cautioned indigenous leaders and workers not to break the unity for petty political gain or immediate electoral benefit and announced that TIPRA would fight alone in all 60 constituencies in the upcoming assembly elections unless the national party intending to forge alliance gives written commitment to the demand of ‘Greater Tipraland’ and implements Sixth Schedule of the Constitution in letter and spirit.

Taking queue from Pradyot, veteran leaders Bijoy Kumar Hrangkhawi and Jagadish Debbarma criticized BJP-IPFT government in Tripura and said, “The state government illegally held up the village council election of ADC for long although held election in Panchayat and urban local bodies in the state. And, none of the poll promises regarding development of ADC and indigenous population had been made by BJP leaders including the Prime Minister before the last assembly polls.”

The BJP, before last assembly elections, had announced to transform ADC into an autonomous state council under Article 244 (A) of the Constitution but after coming to power BJP has failed to fulfill the commitment although tribals voted them to power in 19 of 20 tribal reserved seats.