 "Indian Muslims need not worry about CAA, says Centre amid protests")
Amid protests by Opposition parties over the notification of the rules of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019, the Union Home Ministry on Tuesday issued a statement titled “positive narrative” on the law, which said that “Indian Muslims need not worry” because of the notifying of the CAA.
The statement has come in the context of the Centre notifying them of the CAA rules on Monday evening. The country witnessed widespread protests after Parliament passed the CAA Bill in December 2019.
To concerns that the government could repatriate illegal Muslim migrants to Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, the MHA said: “India does not have any pact or agreement with any of these countries to repatriate migrants back to these countries.”
It said the CAA “doesn't deal with the deportation of illegal immigrants and therefore the concern of a section of the people including Muslims and students that CAA is against Muslim minorities is unjustifiable”.
The MHA said there “is no bar on Muslims from anywhere in the world to seek Indian Citizenship under Section 6 of the Citizenship Act, which deals with citizenship by naturalization”.
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In its statement, the ministry said the CAA “has not made any provision to impact” the citizenship of Muslims and it “has nothing to do with the present 180 million Indian Muslims, who have equal rights like their Hindu counterparts”.
“No Indian citizen would be asked to produce any document to prove his citizenship after this Act.”
A day after the rules for the implementation of the CAA were issued, the MHA launched a portal for submitting applications for eligible people to get Indian citizenship under the CAA. The portal has answers to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about the submission of applications for the grant of citizenship under Section 6B of the Citizenship Act 1955. Applicants must apply online to the Empowered Committee through the District Level Committee (DLC) headed by the Designated Officer (DO).
Addressing a BJP social media volunteers meeting in Hyderabad, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said the CAA had no provision to strip anyone of their citizenship. He accused Opposition leaders of lying that minorities in the country would lose their citizenship with the implementation of CAA.
In Shillong, Meghalaya CM Conrad K Sangma said the CAA would not have any impact in the state since the sixth schedule areas had been exempted from its purview even as several organisations, including the North East Students Organisation, burnt copies of the CAA notification to protest its implementation.
According to a Trinamool Congress statement, West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee will lead a roadshow in Siliguri on Wednesday against the CAA implementation. Addressing an official programme at Habra in North 24 Parganas, Banerjee maintained she would not allow the implementation of the CAA in West Bengal, and urged people to think “several times" before applying for citizenship under the law. Activists, political workers, and students organisations protested the notification of the CAA in the northeast states and also Kerala.
The MHA said the CAA reduces the qualification period of application for citizenship from 11 to 5 years for Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis, and Christians persecuted on religious grounds in Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan and who had entered India on or before December 31, 2014.
The MHA said because of the persecution of minorities in Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, “the name of Islam was badly tarnished all around the world”. However, Islam, being a peaceful religion, never preaches hatred, violence or persecution on religious grounds, and the Act protects Islam from being tarnished in the name of persecution, it said.
“This Act does not prevent any Muslim, who is persecuted in those three Islamic countries for practising their version of Islam, from applying for Indian citizenship under the existing laws,” it said.