Fulfilling the third – and the last – major promise made in the party’s 2019 poll manifesto, the Modi Government notified rules for the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) on March 11, days before the announcement of General Elections 2024.
The implementation of the CAA, over four years after the legislation was passed by Parliament, is both a political and an ideological statement by the Government, which has fulfilled all its big promises during its second term.
Construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya
Enactment of Citizenship Amendment Bill
The first major promise was the abrogation of Article 370 in J&K, the second the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya, and the third, the CAA. The Act, in fact, was passed in December 2019 itself but the rules required to implement it could not be notified, first due to protests and then the outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic The notification of CAA rules puts India in the position of being the ‘home country’ for persecuted minorities in the neighbouring countries as they have nowhere else to go. The move also strengthens the BJP’s ideological position that Hindus in the sub-continent would see India as their ‘motherland’.
And though the rabble-rousing Opposition will try to stir trouble, the move will further ensure Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s return for power for the third consecutive term with a historic landslide victory.
Significantly, the Modi Government has fulfilled all the big promises strictly under the provisions of the Indian Constitution. The construction of Ram Mandir in Ayudhya was given a goahead by the Supreme Court and the abrogation of Article 370 was also upheld by the highest court of the land.
Campaign of calumny
People in the country are bound to appreciate this. They will also value the fact that all these promises could be fulfilled only because India had a strong Government under PM Modi for the last two terms.
Contrary to the Opposition’s campaign of calumny and disinformation, the CAA does not snatch away anyone’s citizenship, In fact, it does not impact any Indian citizen at all. During a decade of his rule, the Opposition has all along blamed PM Modi for not fulfilling his promises. They dismissed the passage of the CAA as a ploy of vote-bank politics. They also questioned the delay in notification of the CAA rules. And now that the stage is set for the operationalisation of the law, they are questioning why it is being put on the fast track.
The CAA is not related to people who are already Indian citizens. No Indian citizen would lose his or her citizenship with the implementation of the new law. It is only meant for those who had been facing persecution at the hands of Muslim majorities in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan and were forced to come to India before December 31, 2024.
