Itanagar: The Indigenous Faith and Cultural Society of Arunachal Pradesh (IFCSAP) has reiterated its demand for early implementation of the anti-conversion law ‘Arunachal Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act, 1978’.
It also demanded the state government to issue the notification of Draft Rule framed under Section-8 of APFR Act, 1978. In a written representation submitted to Chief Minister Pema Khandu at his Secretariat office chamber here on Wednesday, the IFCSAP pointed out that the APFR Act, 1978 which was enacted about 44 years ago had also received the Presidential assent on 25th October, 1978.
“However, the successive governments in the state had failed to implement it till today,” it said. The IFCSAP has demanded the Chief Minister to implement the APFR Act, 1978, while threatening to launch democratic movements and even knock on the doors of the court, in the event of failure of the state government to do so.
The IFCSAP has also appealed to the Chief Minister for renaming of the Department of Indigenous Affairs (DIA) to its already notified name ‘Department of Indigenous Faith & Cultural Affairs’ (DIFCA). Justifying its stand, the IFCSAP stated that the very objective of creating the department was for a government organ that bears an entity reflective of indigenous faith and culture with broad spectrum of promises.
Accordingly, the department was named as DIFCA after creation and notification too was issued in that name. However, in a subsequent notification, the terms ‘Faith & Culture’ were omitted for some obvious reasons. The IFCSAP, therefore, appealed to the CM to restore the two terms and rename the department as ‘DIFCA’ from ‘DIA’.
A team of IFCSAP central executive committee members also called on the Minister of Department of Indigenous Affairs (DIA) Taba Tedir and requested him to look into the matter.
