To live in India, people will have to say ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’, says Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan

Dharmendra Pradhan also criticised the protesters agitating against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC).

Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan has said only those people who are ready to praise Bharat Mata can live in India as he blamed protesters for the violence during the anti-citizenship law agitations across the country.

Dharmendra Pradhan at the inaguration of CNG station in Shivane in Pune, India, on Saturday, December 28, 2019.(Sanket Wankhade/HT PHOTO))

Speaking at the 54th annual three-day conference of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad’s (ABVP) Maharashtra unit in Pune, the minister of petroleum and natural gas made the comments on Saturday.

“Will we make a dharmashala out of our country? Can anyone enter and live in our country? We have to accept this challenge and clarify one thought. In Bharat, you have to say ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’. Only those people can stay,” said Pradhan while speaking in Hindi at the event of the RSS-affiliated students’ organisation.

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Pradhan also criticised the protesters agitating against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC).

“(I ask) these protesting people, is there one country in this world which does not keep an account of its citizens? There is not one country where there is no account of citizens are residents,” he said.

Pradhan also invoked India’s struggle for Independence and several freedom fighters, including Bhagat Singh and Subhas Chandra Bose.

“Will the sacrifice of Bhagat Singh be in vain? Will Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose’s sacrifice be in vain? Did uncountable Indians fight for our freedom so that 70 years after freedom this country will think about whether or not to keep accountability of citizenship or not?” the minister asked.

He put the onus of the violence in various parts of the country during the anti-CAA and NRC protests on the protesters.

“When citizens residing in this country are subjected to violence in the name of citizenship, the relevance and responsibility of organisations like ABVP increases. The people, who mislead the country, break it, and perpetrate violence and propaganda, can only be answered by nationalist groups,” he said.

More than 20 people have been killed during protests against the amended citizenship law and NRC across the country.

The amended citizenship law will grant citizenship to non-Muslims, who escaped to India fearing religious persecution in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh. They will also be eligible to get citizenship by naturalisation in half the time.

Critics say the law discriminates on the basis of religion and undermines the Constitution and several parties have filed petitions against CAA before the Supreme Court challenging the act.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-led government has denied all allegations.