The Punjab government would not allow the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in the state and would continue to fight it "tooth and nail", Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh said on Monday.
Addressing Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) leaders and workers at a protest march, Singh lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for "trying to change the Constitution's preamble", and called upon all Indians to unite against their "divisive and dangerous attempts" to "destroy the nation's secular fabric" with the CAA.
The protest march was attended by senior Congress leaders, including All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary in-charge of Punjab, Asha Kumari, Punjab Congress president Sunil Jakhar, and other senior leaders such as Preneet Kaur, Manpreet Badal, Gurpreet Singh Kangar, Bharat Bhushan Ashu, Sadhu Singh Dharamsot, Balbir Sidhu, and Ravneet Singh Bittu, besides a large number of party MLAs.
Singh said that the BJP "could not get away with its nefarious designs" and pointed out that the protests against the CAA were going on currently in 16 states, including Punjab.
Reading out the preamble, he said it was the very basis of India's foundation, which "nobody could disturb". While Articles of the Constitution are amended from time to time, not just in India but across the world, no one can tolerate tinkering with its basic structure, he added, pointing out that even the United Nations had termed the CAA discriminatory.
Referring to the manhandling of the AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi in Uttar Pradesh, Singh said that the police could not have indulged in such behaviour without CM Yogi Adiyanath's knowledge.
"Aren't you ashamed of such actions," he asked the Uttar Pradesh CM, warning that the Congress would not forget this incident and tables would turn one day.
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Pointing out that the MIT students had also passed a resolution against CAA, the Punjab CM observed that while the entire world was expressing concern over the ramifications of the legislation, "those sitting in Delhi continue to be adamant, refusing to pay heed to the voice of the nation."
Singh pointed out that Sri Guru Nanak Dev ji had also taught secularism, as manifest in his words "na koi hindu, na koi musalman, sab rab de bande" (nobody is a Muslim or a Hindu, all are God's people).
The protest march, held in Punjab's economic heartland, would help send the anti-CAA message across India, asserted Singh.
In an informal chat with media persons later, Singh reiterated that his government would continue to oppose the Centre's attempt to destroy India's secular character and change the Preamble of the Constitution.
On the manhandling of Priyanka by UP police, he termed the incident shameful. It was shameful, said the Chief Minister, that Guru Nanak Dev Ji's secular ideology was being attacked while his 550th birth anniversary was being celebrated across the world.
Earlier, senior party leader and Finance Minister Manpreet Badal recalled Mahatama Gandhi's removal from a train in South Africa, prompting him to warn the White officials that he will throw them out of his country.
Likening the current situation with that incident, Manpreet said if Prime Minister Narendra Modi tried to send Indians out of the country, the Congress will turn him (PM Modi) out of India. Noting that the BJP had secured a mere 39% votes in the last Lok Sabha elections, he asserted that with the remaining 61% supporting the opposition parties, the Modi government could not get away with the enactment of such black laws.
PPCC president Sunil Jakhar lambasted the 'kale angrez sitting in Delhi' (BJP-led central government) for trying to implement the agenda which the pre-Independence'goras' (Whites) had failed to execute.
The people accepted the demonetisation and GST assaults patiently but had not lost all their patience, he said, pointing to the country-wide anti-CAA protests, led by students.
Pointing to PM Modi's claims of identifying people by their clothes, Jakhar warned that no citizen would escape the ill-effects of the Centre's actions. He took a dig at the BJP leadership's 'tukde tukde gang' remarks, saying the NDA itself was a 'tukde tukde' government, which was out to divide the country.
Congress member from Punjab Ravneet Singh Bittu termed the CAA a black law, which, he said, the majority of the states would not implement since about 70 per cent of the Chief Ministers were now from the Congress and other Opposition parties, marking a clear decline for the BJP graph.
Singh earlier also participated in the protest march that started from Daresi Ground and culminated at the statue of Mahatma Gandhi at Matarani Chowk.
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