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BJP’s ‘true face’, says Chidambaram on promise to implement CAA in Bengal
In its manifesto for the upcoming assembly elections in West Bengal, the BJP has promised that the contentious CAA will be approved in the first cabinet meeting if elected in the eastern state.
Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram on Monday said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has revealed its ‘true face’ by promising to approve the implementation of the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA in West Bengal in its manifesto for the assembly elections in the eastern state.
“The CAA will divide the country, discriminate against Muslims and deprive millions of Indians of their birthright of citizenship,” the former Union finance minister said in one of his tweets. “The intent is to intimidate and put fear in the minds of poor and law-abiding citizens, especially Muslims, and threaten them with incarceration in detention camps. The people of Assam and Bengal must vote decisively to defeat the BJP and its poisonous agenda,” Chidambaram added.
Union home minister Amit Shah on Sunday evening released the BJP’s manifesto, ‘Sankalp Patra’, for the eight-phase elections in West Bengal from March 27, promising that the implementation of CAA will be announced in the first cabinet meeting once the party is elected in the state.
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The CAA, which was passed in December 2019, aims at giving Indian citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Buddhists, Jains and Parsis who had entered India from the neighbouring countries of Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan, before December 31, 2014. The legislation is controversial as it excludes Muslims from its purview and thus triggered protests across the country, several of which turned violent. The protests initially started in the northeastern states, including Assam, over fears of infiltrations of immigrants from Bangladesh.
The BJP has an incumbent government in Assam, which is going to polls during the same period as neighbouring West Bengal. While the BJP has largely avoided talking about the CAA in the northeastern state, the Congress, in its manifesto, has promised to scrap the act if it returns to power in Assam.
