Union Home Minister Once Again Promises (or Threatens?) Implementation(?) of CAA

[Sukla Sen]

Why wait for the poll??

And what "notification" he's talking of???

(Ref.: <https://twitter.com/Logical_Girll/status/1756256241016590810>.)

The Gazette notification of the CAA 2019 was in fact issued way back on December 10 of the same year having been passed by the parliament just the very previous day. The Union Home Ministry subsequently notified that it'd come into force from January 10 2020. (Ref.: 'Centre yet to notify rules of Citizenship Amendment Act' at <https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/caa-rules-not-notified-till-last-date-of-third-extended-deadline/article38207649.ece>.)

Till today -- after a lapse of more than three years -- the Rules remain to be framed! It should have been possible to do in a fortnight or a month or so. The pandemic lockdown would be announced only on March 24 evening that year to come into force at midnight.

Let us, in this context, recall:

AA.

III. It [i.e. the CAA], thereby, goes against a foundational tenet of the Indian Constitution: non-discrimination on the basis of religion, caste, gender etc.

(Special supports for the weak and marginalised exempted.)

IV. Still then, it's not likely to have any significant impact on the ground, outside of the North-East and West Bengal.

Even there, it's somewhat doubtful.

V. It, nevertheless, promises citizenship to (otherwise ineligible) some while withholding such privilege to others - based on religion.

That's toxic.

But, by itself, it doesn't take away anyone's citizenship.

VI. The promise, by and large, appears to be a hoax.

That the "rules" are yet to be framed - even after a year, clearly shows up the lack of seriousness in granting citizenship.

VII. Far more importantly, it's a red herring [emphasis added].

It's meant to mislead - to pit those who have been denied this "promise" against those who have been offered ("promise" only).

Quite unfortunately, the opponents of the regime have taken the bait [emphasis added].

VIII. The real monster is the NRC, of which the NPR is the first, and most critical operational, part.

(Once the NPR is done, the NRC becomes almost the done thing.)

IX. The NRC operation makes vast sections of Indians, not in possession of documents related to ownership of ancestral land/house or such, extremely vulnerable to the threat - that the exercise overlies, of being stripped of citizenship.

That's too terrifying.

(Excerpted from: 'CAA: The Points to Note' by Sukla Se, dtd. Dec. 21 2020 at <https://frontierweekly.com/views/dec-20/21-12-20-On%20CAA.html>.)

BB.

The CAA, it bears iterating, has little significance when uncoupled from the NRC.
It has been brought in to (falsely) reassure the Hindus that even if they're filtered out by the NRC process - crores and crores are sure to encounter that predicament, there's nothing to worry.
(In Assam 33 million people subjected themselves to the NRC process and, eventually, 1.9 million have been left out (ref.: <https://indianexpress.com/article/india/assam-nrc-final-list-bjp-congress-bangladesh-illegal-migration-5954490/>). That's about 6% of the total applicants.
A Large number of Hindus - maybe about half, are, understandably, there among the left-outs.
By this token, in [the] case of India, as a whole, at least 60 million would be left out.
Not to forget that the parameters for the rest of India would be rather stiffer: <https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/et-explains/is-a-pan-india-nrc-possible-the-lesson-from-assam/articleshow/72454225.cms>.)

That's, apparently, a false promise - as in order to avail of the special privilege promised by the CAB one'll have to establish that one has come from either Afghanistan or Bangladesh or Pakistan, on or before Dec. 31st 2014.
That could be quite tricky (ref.: <https://scroll.in/article/946430/bjp-claims-citizenship-bill-will-save-those-left-of-nrc-but-bengali-hindus-in-assam-are-sceptical>).
Never mind.

The real issue, here, is that the NPR/NRC is a central, and *not* s state, programme.
The state may, at the most. withhold wholehearted cooperation.
That's all a state can do.

Here, it needs be kept in mind, the (NRC) scheme is not powered by mere anti-Muslim prejudices; it's central aim is to wilfully trigger and perpetuate a civil war-like situation in India in order to help mobilise the Hindus as "Hindus", drowning out all other competing identities linked to gender, ethnicity, language, caste, class, age-group etc., so very necessary to derive the requisite propulsion for the journey towards a "Hindu Rashtra" - denuded of all vestiges of substantive democracy and pluralism, undertaken and piloted by the incumbent regime.
No price is too high to accomplish that goal.
Not even a huge chaos much larger than the one caused by demonetisation.

(Ref.: '#'Naa' to CAA! India Must Rise against CAA-NRC to Halt the Approaching Huge Chaos and Fiendish Genocide: President Signs at Midnight: Act Notified', dtd. Dec. 13 2019, at <https://groups.google.com/g/greenyouth/c/q1LNbmefKrI/m/Q6wpTsGiAQAJ>.)

Quite likely, these repeated announcements (ref.: <https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/caa-is-the-law-of-the-land-no-one-can-stop-it-amit-shah/article67678966.ece>, <https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/caa-will-be-implemented-across-india-within-7-days-union-ministers-big-guarantee-in-bengal-101706496330258.html>, <https://www.deccanherald.com/india/west-bengal/caa-will-implemented-at-earliest-says-union-minister-shantanu-thakur-2878540>) are only geared to trigger a new instalment of anti-CAA agitations to polarise the society even further on religious line by engaging those immigrant Hindus who are (naively and endlessly) waiting for grant of citizenship as promised by the CAA 2019.

The least that one should do is not to fall in that trap and train all the guns specifically on NRC/NPR and the pending Census in its present format which makes it congruent with the NPR -- the first step and, arguably, the most crucial element of the NRC process.

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Peace Is Doable