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Park Circus protest site Chidambaram’s first port of call in Kolkata
A Shaheen Bagh style sit-in agitation against CAA at Kolkata’s Park Circus Maidan entered its 12th day Saturday.
Former Union minister and Congress leader who arrived in Kolkata Friday night to train the party’s state leaders on how to counter the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) at a workshop, headed straight for Park Circus where a Shaheen Bagh style sit-in agitation against CAA that entered its 12th day Saturday.
The media was not informed about Chidambaram’s visit to Park Circus. He talked to the protesters comprising mostly Muslim women, and said he was there on humanitarian ground and not as a Congress leader.
Hundreds of Muslims women including, students, homemakers and senior citizens are sitting on an indefinite demonstration and spending the nights in the open, protesting the CAA, the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the National Population Register (NPR) at the Park Circus Maidan in South Kolkata.
After several requests, the state government provided water, light and bio-toilets at the site two days ago
Social activist Yogendra Yadav and singer Kabir Suman had earlier visited Park Circus to extend their support to the protesters.
The CAA which was passed by the Parliament last month has triggered protests in many parts of the country. Kolkata has seen a large number of protests with Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee pitching herself as the most trenchant critic of the law which fast-tracks Indian citizenship for non-Muslim refugees from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh who arrived in India before December 31, 2014.
The Opposition insists that the law is divisive, discriminatory and unconstitutional because it makes religion a test of citizenship. They also contend that in conjunction with the NRC, the CAA can be dangerous because marginalized people are unlikely to have documents to prove their citizenship.
The government has repeatedly claimed that the law is only meant to provide citizenship and not to take it away. The BJP has recently launched a mass outreach to allay fears about the law.
