Indian media reports that protests against Modi govt have spread throughout country for passing anti-Muslim, discriminatory law for citizenship in India.
NEW DEHLI: (Urdu Point/Pakistan Point News-Dec 14th, 2019) A big setback for Modi government, especially for Home Minister Amit Shah as majority of the Indian public rejected Citizen (Amendment) Act ---a discriminatory citizenship law against Muslims, by starting countrywide protests, Indian media reported here on Saturday.
Northeastern parts of Indian are burning as anti-citizenship law protest have reached Uttar Pradesh and Bengal. Thousands of protesters Assam defied curfew to organise protests, a massive rally heading to the Meghalaya Governor’s residence in Shillong against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act turned violent, leaving several injured.
According to Indian media, protests against the new law also spread to West Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh and even New Delhi, prompting Home Minister Amit Shah to cancel his visits to Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh scheduled for Sunday and Monday.
In Uttar Pradesh, the reports said, the government ordered a crackdown in Aligarh, the seat of the Aligarh Muslim University, after students and teachers joined protests. The government shut down internet and mobile service there. Even there was strong protest in New Dehli as students of the Jamia Millia Islamia University in Delhi took out a march to Parliament to register their protest and clashed with the police. The local administration failed to stop the students from gathering at the protest site in Dehli. Initially, the police stopped the students from going to the university campus and then Dehli Metro bus service was suspended to stop the students at Patel Chowk and Janpath.
The reports said that the violence escalated in Bengal with protestors targeting four railway stations and engaging in arson while a rail maintenance car was set ablaze. The protesters also stopped suburban train services from Kolkata, especially on the 24-Parganas route, with the tracks being blocked at several places. Around 17 minority groups took out rallies in Kolkata and set up blockades in the city, hours after Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced that the CAB would not be implemented in West Bengal.
Likewise, the protests paralysed train services on the Howrah- Kharagpur section for hours. People in the minority-dominated districts of rural Howrah, Murshidabad, Birbhum, parts of Burdwan and North Bengal hit the streets, raising slogans against the Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre, the Indian media reported.
In addition to that, In Arunachal Pradesh, university students boycotted exams and hit the streets under the banner of the Students Union of NERIST (SUN) against Modi government for introducing anti-Muslim law in India.
On other hand, the United Nations’ human rights body called the CAB fundamentally discriminatory. “We are concerned that India’s new Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019 is fundamentally discriminatory in nature,” UN human rights spokesman Jeremy Laurence was quoted by Indian media as saying in Geneva. According to the reports, he said that the new law would have discriminatory effect on people’s access to nationality.
Countrywide protest against Modi government have created law and order situation and according to the sources, the Modi government was seriously worried on the arising situation in India.
