“How about the 1.5 lakh Muslims in Assam who are not on the list?” AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi queries the CAA’s implementation
Asaduddin Owaisi, the leader of AIMIM and a Lok Sabha MP, raised concerns over the whereabouts of 1.5 lakh Muslims in Assam who were purportedly excluded from the National Register of Citizens (NRC) list after the state’s implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).Days after the BJP-led Centre released the guidelines for implementing the CAA nationwide, Owaisi addressed a public meeting in Hyderabad on Friday. “Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma stated that the 12 lakh Hindus who were not included in the state’s NRC will be granted Indian citizenship under the CAA,” Owaisi said.
How about the 1.5 lakh Muslims, though?”According to Owaisi, Muslims who are not included on the NRC list would be required to verify their lineage by visiting the Foreigners’ Tribunal and tracing their family back to 1962 or even 1951.”We’ll inquire as to whether they arrived in 1951 or 1962. They will be required to provide their grandfathers’ birth certificates and supporting documentation. The head of AIMIM said, “Those 1.5 lakh Muslims will be asked to square off at the Foreigners’ Tribunal.”Although the BJP has attempted to assuage local Muslims’ concerns that the CAA would not affect them, Owaisi cautioned that such “things” will occur eventually.”They (the BJP) are claiming that nothing will happen right now. I want to let them know that things take time to come to pass,” he stated.
Owaisi brought attention to the fact that Union Home Minister Amit Shah has often said that the National Population Register (NPR) and the NRC would come after the CAA.”NRC and NPR will also be adopted, Home Minister Amit Shah said in Parliament. Did he not mention NPR and NRC in interviews on television? stated the MP from Hyderabad.
The AIMIM head remarked, “The Supreme Court directed the government to conduct NRC in Assam,” in reference to the NRC operation in the state of Assam, where a sizable portion of the populace discovered their names missing in the final list. Under the supervision of the Supreme Court, the NRC was carried out in Assam after investing Rs 1,600 crore. There were 19 lakh people who were not on the list. There were 1.5 lakh Muslims and 10–12 lakh Hindus among them.However, Owaisi said that he was amenable to the notion of giving citizenship to marginalized groups from nearby nations, but the process shouldn’t be dictated by a person’s religious beliefs.
“The government must give citizenship to people who come from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh, but on the basis of religion,” he said.A few days before the timetable for the Lok Sabha elections was announced, on Monday, the Union Home Ministry informed the public of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) guidelines.The CAA regulations, which were presented by the Center and approved by the Parliament in 2019, seek to grant Indian citizenship to non-Muslim migrants who have been persecuted. These migrants include Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis, and Christians who came to India prior to December 31, 2014, and who came from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.
