CAA row impacts national polity, foreign ties

Shock waves set in motion by the Bharatiya Janata Pary-led government’s Citizenship Act amendment (CAA) are damaging not only India’s polity but also its external relations.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who initially placed the CAA protests in the context of the Hindu-Muslim binary with his remark that trouble-makers can be identified by their clothes, gave it an India-Pakistan dimension last week by asking his critics to raise their voice against persecution of minorities in the neighbouring country.

Addressing a meeting in Karnataka, he said, “If you have to shout slogans, then go and shout slogans against the atrocities against religious minorities in Pakistan. If you have to take out rallies, then do so in support of the oppressed refugees from Pakistan.”

The CAA amendment is ostensibly aimed at helping non-Muslim refugees from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan to obtain Indian citizenship. However, in his speech Modi referred only to Pakistan.

On New Year’s Day, Modi personally conveyed greetings to his counterparts in all South Asian countries except one. The exception was Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan.

Taunting Modi for harping on Pakistan, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerji asked, “Are you India’s Prime Minister or Pakistan’s Ambassador?” Last week some cities across the country witnessed anti-CAA demonstrations by various organisations of the Muslim community.

As the community is the primary target of the law, understandably, it is more concerned than the rest. And it is entitled to make known its feelings through democratic means. However, it must guard against playing into the hands of those seeking to accentuate the religious divide.

By and large the CAA protests have been spearheaded by young men and women, who rose above the atmosphere of fear and hatred, actuated by a desire to save secularism and democracy. All those who value these concepts have a duty to strengthen their hands.

So far the BJP has not been able to come up with a suitable strategy to deal with protesting youth.

Both Modi and Home Minister and party President Amit Shah have found it convenient to give the Congress credit for the protests and indulge in a shadow fight against it.

The audacious attack on teachers and student leaders of the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University in the capital on Sunday night by masked men, with the police passively looking on, appears to be a sign of increasing desperation on the part of the ruling dispensation and its supporters. Meanwhile, more evidence of motivated police action against protesters, particularly Muslims, surfaced in Uttar Pradesh.

Among those the police asked to furnish sureties for good conduct following violent protests in Firozabad were a man who died six years ago and two nonagenarians who are bedridden.

Embarrassed by the disclosure, the district police claimed informers had misled them. It appears more likely that someone had picked Muslim names from an old voters’ list.

There are complaints of police failing to provide medical aid to detainees.  A doctor at the Firozabad district hospital said Ghulam Nabi, a cancer patient who suffered multiple injuries in the police action and was under detention, was to be admitted for a surgery but the police did not bring him.

Barring one or two, Indian channels and newspapers have been chary of looking into the conduct of the UP police. Three foreign outlets, the New York Times, the Guardian and Al Jazeera TV brought to light information they had shied away from.

Kerala, which stayed work on the National People’s Register, taking into account the possibility that the data collected may be used for NRC purposes, took another anti-CAA initiative. The State Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution asking the Centre to withdraw the CAA.

State Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who is a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), wrote to 11 non-BJP Chief Ministers proposing that they act together to preserve the basic tenets of the polity.

With the United Nations and several countries, including the United States, sharply criticising the gross violations of human rights, the External Affairs Ministry was working overtime to contain the damage.

Former Foreign Secretary and National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon said foreign media reports indicated a shift in global public opinion on India. He described it as a self-inflicted goal, and warned India could face international isolation.

Last month Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had cancelled his annual summit with Modi as Guwahati, where they were to meet, was engulfed in protests.