TCN News
Popular Front of India, in their press release, have stated that in their recently concluded National Executive Council meeting, they passed a resolution urging both citizens and political parties to defeat the re-introduction of the Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB) and to resist the attempts to extend the National Register of Citizenship (NRC) process that is currently being implemented in Assam from being introduced in all other parts of the country.
The Citizenship Amendment Bill under consideration by the central government is openly discriminatory towards Muslims, the press statement mentions, and that the Bill which allows migrants belonging to all religions except Islam to obtain citizenship in India is a vile move that undermines the constitutional principles of secularism and democracy and an official move to alienate Muslims.
Through their press release the members of PFI (Popular front of India) have also appealed to the Supreme Court of India to postpone the deadline set in Assam for providing the credentials to NRC. The deadline 31st July is fast approaching and reports from the ground show the complicated process is failing many from fulfilling the process. The tragedy of tens of thousands of people losing their citizenship and being reduced to prisoners without civil rights in the country where they were born, lived and fought for, merely due to procedural lapse must be avoided. They appealed to the Apex Court to extend the present deadline to a fairly convenient date, giving enough time for the smooth completion of the process.
Objecting to the attempts to extend NRC across the country, the press release said that the Amendment made by the Union Home Ministry to the Foreigners (Tribunals) Order, 1964 on May 30 can have far-reaching ramifications on the lives of minorities. It empowers state governments, district administrations and even district magistrates in all states to constitute tribunals and refer cases to decide on citizenship issue. Once the authenticity of a person’s citizenship is being questioned, the concerned individual has to prove that he/she is a legitimate citizen.
In Assam itself, lives of legitimate citizens particularly that of Bengali speaking Muslims have been shattered due to the wrong implementation of NRC and prejudiced functioning of Foreigner Tribunals. Seen in the light of the Amit Shah’s election promise of driving out “infiltrators” belonging to “foreign religions” from all states, PFI said, it can lead to political misuse of powers, creating an Assam like situation in other states too.