Divisive step ahead of LS election, say Opposition parties

The Opposition parties questioned the timing of notification of rules for the Citizenship Amendment Act just ahead of the election, and called it a divisive step aimed at diverting attention from the controversy over electoral bonds.

In a post on X, Congress general secretary (communications) Jairam Ramesh pointed out that it had taken the government four years and three months to bring the rules of an Act that was passed by Parliament in December 2019.

“The Prime Minister claims that his government works in a businesslike and timebound manner. The time taken to notify the rules for the CAA is yet another demonstration of the Prime Minister’s blatant lies,” he said.

He also alleged that the announcement was yet another attempt to “manage the headlines” after the Supreme Court’s strictures on the electoral bonds issue. “After seeking nine extensions for notification of the rules, the timing right before the elections is evidently designed to polarise the election, especially in West Bengal and Assam,” he said.

Congress sees it as another attempt to ‘manage headlines’ after SC’s strictures on electoral bonds

With the CAA rules being issued, the government will now start granting Indian citizenship to persecuted nonMuslim migrants from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan, who came to India till December 31, 2014.

‘Politics of distraction’

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav used the opportunity to attack the BJP citing the high rate of emigration in their 10year rule. “When the citizens of the country are forced to go out for livelihood, then what will happen by bringing ‘citizenship law’ for others? The public has now understood the BJP’s game of politics of distraction,” he posted on X.

Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati too took to social media to question the utility of the CAA. “Instead of implementing the law before the election, it would have been better to implement it only after clearing doubts, confusion and addressing the fear about the law,” she said.

The notification of rules for the Citizenship (Amendment) Act of 2019 has sparked protests in Assam and elsewhere in the Northeast.

Members of organisations representing indigenous communities burnt copies of the CAA notification in some parts of Assam on Monday evening as the police sounded a high alert across the State and put barricades in place to offset a rerun of the violent antiCAA protests in 2019 that left five persons, including a minor, dead.

Led by the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), 30 organisations have appealed to people to put up a united fight against the controversial Act while the Congressled Opposition alliance of 16 political parties announced a Statewide ‘hartal’ or noncooperation movement from Tuesday.

The political parties and NGOs have refrained from calling a bandh given the Gauhati High Court’s 2019 order that makes losses incurred due to shutdowns and damage to public property recoverable from people behind such stirs.

“Riding its numerical strength in Parliament, the government headed by the dictatorial BJP has imposed the CAA on us. This Act will bring doom for the indigenous people of Assam and the rest of the northeast,” AASU president Utpal Sarma said.

“The CAA, which threatens the language, culture, and existence of the Assamese people, cannot be accepted at any cost,” he said.

The Asom Jatiyatabadi Yuva Chhatra Parishad condemned the Centre’s decision and threatened to intensify the agitation. “We will intensify our protests from Tuesday by burning the effigies of the Prime Minister and the Union Home Minister. We cannot allow the Hindu Bangladeshis to be dumped on us,” the organisation’s leader, Palash Changmai said.

ActivistturnedMLA Akhil Gogoi, who spent months in jail on charges of instigating the 2019 antiCAA violence, said the CAA was an assault on the Assamese community. “The BJP is attacking Assam via this Act like the Mughals did. I appeal to the people to come together to protest against the implementation of the CAA peacefully and democratically,” he said.

Senior Congress leader Debabrata Saikia pointed out that the CAA, paving the way for faster citizenship for nonMuslims who came from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan till December 31, 2014, was a mockery of the Assam Accord of 1985 prescribing March 24, 1971, as the cutoff date for accepting those who entered Assam illegally.

“The people to be granted citizenship by the CAA can stay in Assam, buy land and property, and enjoy all facilities. [Narendra] Modiji had ahead of the 2014 [Lok Sabha] election said all illegal immigrants would be driven out of the country if he became the Prime Minister. After 10 years, he is now allowing the same set of people to come to Assam and become citizens,” he said.

Protests have also been lined up in the other northeastern States, specifically Meghalaya and Tripura, by the North East Students’ Organisation.