India has implemented the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) enacted in 2019 after four years. Critics have been calling the law anti-Muslim. The Narendra Modi-led government issued a notice to implement the law on Monday (March 11) ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. Modi will fight to become the Prime Minister of India for the third time in the elections. British news agency Reuters reported this news.
A spokesperson for the Indian Prime Minister’s Office told Reuters that the Modi government has announced the implementation of the CAA. It was an integral part of BJP’s 2019 manifesto. As a result, oppressed people will have the opportunity to get Indian citizenship.
According to the law passed in 2019, religiously persecuted minorities (Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians) from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan will get Indian citizenship. For the time being till December 31, 2014 these minorities who have taken refuge in India will be granted citizenship.
After protests and violence spread in various places including New Delhi, the law was enacted at that time but the central government of India did not implement it.
Earlier in February, Indian Home Minister Amit Shah had said that the CAA would come into effect before the Lok Sabha elections.
Muslim groups say the combined CAA and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC) discriminate against 20 crore Muslims. They fear that the government may cancel the citizenship of undocumented Muslims in some border states.
The Indian government does not agree to accept the law as anti-Muslim. They claim the law is needed to help oppressed minorities in Muslim-majority countries.
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