Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Thursday said the Congress was maintaining a studied silence from the beginning when the country witnessed strong agitations spearheaded by Left parties against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and the proposal for a National Register of Citizens (NRC) and National Population Register (NPR).
Did any senior Congress leader or MPs from Kerala court arrest when the agitations galvanised thousands against the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Hindutva project, he asked.
He was addressing a public rally organised by the Left Democratic Front in Thiruvananthapuram demanding repeal of the CAA.
Though the Congress in Kerala was initially in favour of supporting the anti-CAA protests and extended support to agitations and resolutions passed by the Cabinet, the first in the country, the party later went back on its commitment.
“It is presumed that the Kerala unit of the Congress was forced to keep a distance from the anti-CAA protests due to insistence of the Congress central leadership,” Mr. Vijayan said.
Any attempt to treat Muslims as second-class citizens in the country would not be allowed and the Left would always be at the forefront of asserting their rights, he said.
“What the country now needs is a united fight against the draconian law. Sadly, the Congress’ Bharat Jodo Yatra’ led by party leader Rahul Gandhi was also silent on the CAA,” Mr. Vijayan said. He said the new law was a challenge to the very ideals of the concept of India and the Constitution.
Ahead of the election, the Centre was maintaining that no Indian citizen would be asked to produce any document to prove citizenship under the Act. However, the country had seen that over 19 lakh people in Assam were excluded when the final National Register of Citizens (NRC) was released, he said.
Further, the announcement by Union Home Minister Amit Shah that the Union government would single out every intruder in the country and throw them out before 2024 was a clear message to the people about what’s in store for them, Mr. Vijayan said.
