The talk of “illegal immigration” is now resonating in Arunachal Pradesh, with demands to further tighten its Inner Line Permit (ILP) regime that regulates the entry of non-locals into the state and that is already among the strictest in the country.Last week, following discussions with various local organisations, Chief Minister Pema Khandu announced the formation of a high-powered committee led by a Cabinet minister to examine and recommend measures for strengthening the ILP framework and a review of the guidelines issued earlier this year.AdvertisementHe also announced three other high-powered panels to look into interlinked concerns: a re-verification of Arunachal Pradesh Scheduled Tribes (APST) certificates; the status of children born of APST mothers and non-APST fathers; and “illegal infiltration”.The anxietiesThe wave of recent protests demanding a re-look at the existing system have largely been spearheaded by the Arunachal ST Bachao Andolan Committee. According to its general secretary Millo Ambo, their attention shifted to the ILP when they took up the issue in 2024 of non-APST persons “fraudulently” acquiring APST certificates.In Arunachal, an APST document helps avail reserved quotas in government jobs and education institutions, land ownership, and special state government schemes.Advertisement“While we were carrying on that campaign and trying to identify people who had wrongfully acquired such certificates, we realised that if there had been proper records of ILP entry, it would have been much easier. So then, our focus went towards tightening of the ILP,” Ambo says.He also identifies a new set of guidelines issued in March this year for enforcement of the ILP in Aruanchal as the trigger for the recent protests. Among the guidelines’ clauses that the ST Bachao Andolan Committee calls contentious include the Secretary (Political), Government of Arunachal Pradesh, being authorised to issue a temporary or work ILP “to any person, valid for any period”.The Committee has also questioned special provisions allowed to heads and officials of “mega projects” – that is, projects worth Rs 500 crore and more – such as for sponsorship of work ILPs of up to 200 labourers at a time, and a provision to extend these work ILPs to up to two years from a person’s date of entry into the state.Pointing to major projects such as Arunachal Frontier Highway and Siang mega dam that are in the works, and the state’s reliance on labour from outside the state for construction work, Ambo says: “If all this is implemented without strengthening the process of monitoring and tracking ILP holders, especially whether they exit after the expiry of the permit or not, this might have an effect on the demography of our state.”The DIG of the Itanagar Capital Range, Tumme Amo, admits some limitations to the enforcement of the ILP. “There is a need for digital intervention because it is currently difficult to trace someone if they stay beyond the valid period. There are no means to track them,” he says.Eid rowWith these anxieties swirling, the spectre of “illegal immigration” – which is one of the pet concerns of the BJP, which is in power in the state – has now entered the picture. The main voice in this is the Arunachal Pradesh Indigenous Youth Organization, which called a bandh recently on Bakrid to protest against “illegally constructed mosques” and “illegal immigrants”.DIG Amo says the claims of migrants entering illegally from outside the country – Arunachal borders Myanmar, Bhutan and Tibet – is not supported by facts. “Over the course of all of 2025, we identified around 7,000 people in the Itanagar capital region without valid ILPs during detection drives. None of them were migrants from another country. They were mostly from Assam, largely labourers, and truck drivers from states like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar who had come carrying goods and might not have known the rules,” Amo says.ILP regimeThe Inner Line Permit regime, in place in Arunachal – along with Nagaland, Mizoram and, more recently, Manipur – requires Indians from other parts of the country to secure an ILP document issued by the respective state governments to enter and stay for any period of time, whether for tourism or work.In response to a question in the Lok Sabha on the issue in 2020, the Union Home Minister said, “The ILP system was promulgated to preserve the culture and traditions of tribes living in the area beyond the Inner Line and to safeguard their title to tribal land and protect their resources.”While the ILP regime was introduced in Manipur in 2020, Meghalaya continues to push for it.In addition, as a border state, the entire Arunachal comes under the Protected Area regime, which means that a foreign national is not allowed to visit without a permit from the Union Home Ministry. This Protected Area regime remained in place in all of Arunachal even when it was relaxed from 2010 onwards, till 2024, for Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram.The Manipur government had then stated that the reimposition was “in light of growing security concerns arising from neighbouring countries”.