India Ceases to be a Secular Country as Modi Regime Starts Implementing CAA through Backdoor? – P J James

By opening Indian citizenship route to just 6 non-Muslim categories – Hindus, Sikhs, Parsis, Christians, Buddhists and Jain’s – from 3 countries (Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh), the Modi government has started implementation of the CAA, by totally excluding Muslims. In the same vein, hectic moves are in full swing to identify Muslim refugees including the Rohingyas, “the most persecuted minority”, according to UN, and deporting them to outside mainly to Bangladesh.

Though the regime claims this move in terms of the 2015 amendment of Citizenship Rules that legalised the stay of migrants and exempted them from the provisions of the Passport Act and the Foreigners Act even after the expiry of their passports, in effect it tantamounts to partial implementation of the of CAA (2019) that aims to grant citizenship exclusively to illegal or undocumented 6 non-Muslim communities.

Thus, in view of the people’s simmering discontent against CAA that may flare up at any moment, while claiming that CAA is not yet in force on the one hand, the Modi government has started fast-tracking it under the cover of 2015 Citizenship Amendment Rules, on the other. No doubt, this heinous move is also to be read along with the series of Hindutva offensives targeting Muslim minorities initiated in recent times as part of RSS-BJP move towards its ultimate goal of Hindurashtra.

The CPI (ML) Red Star resolutely condemns this implementation of CAA through backdoor, and calls upon progressive-democratic forces, the working people and all oppressed to resist and defeat this neofascist move that altogether undermines the secular character of India.

P J James
General Secretary
CPI (ML) Red Star
20/12/2022