Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday claimed that the CAA is completely insignificant in Assam, from where there will be the “least number of applications” for Indian citizenship.
The Ministry of Home Affairs had on Tuesday launched a portal for people eligible to apply for Indian citizenship under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019.
“CAA is completely insignificant in Assam; the state will have the least number of applications on the portal,” Sarma told a press conference here.
The Centre on Monday implemented the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, notifying the rules four years after the law was passed by Parliament to fast-track citizenship for undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who came to India before December 31, 2014.
Sarma said the act is very clear that the cut-off date for application of citizenship is December 31, 2014, and in Assam, with the updation of the National Register of Citizens, people who applied for it and did not find their names in that list, will only apply for CAA.
“People seeking citizenship have to give evidence that they entered before 2014 and the NRC will be the proof in Assam, but in other states, this does not exist. If they have not applied for NRC, it becomes clear that they were not there in the state before the cut-off date, and as such cannot get citizenship,” he said.
There has been no application from Assam so far on the portal since it opened on Tuesday, Sarma claimed.
“The NRC has the details of the number of people who have applied, and due to technology, all data will be available on the internet and nothing can be hidden. The data will be presented in Parliament,” he said.
Citizenship will be granted by the central government and it is not a state subject, the CM said.
''We will work with reason and not emotion. Many will have to answer for the death of five persons during the anti-CAA protests in December 2019. After the application process is over, I will file a case in the high court seeking an answer to who was responsible for the deaths,” Sarma said.
“Assam is used as a corridor and even if anybody enters, he passes through it and goes to other places, as the issue has become so sensitive and debatable in the state. Besides, there are tribunals and the concept of Doubtful or 'D' voters here, which does not exist in the other states,” the chief minister said.
Youths from Assam are going to Gujarat and Karnataka to work as the labour rates are high there, “so why will the Bangladeshis stay here”, he said.
The data that Bangladesh has lost 1.3 crore Hindu population gets highlighted, but the fact that Muslim population has increased to 3 crore due to conversion is not mentioned, Sarma claimed.
“Our complaint is that minorities are being converted in the three countries, and it was for this reason that the CAA was enacted,” he said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will return for a third term after the Lok Sabha polls, Sarma said.
''Even if a top star of Bollywood contests against the prime minister in Varanasi, Modiji will win. He is etched in the minds and hearts of people who will ensure his win,” he said.
Earlier, the chief minister had claimed that the BJP was confident of winning 11 seats, but ''the Congress has comitted suicide with the selection of its candidates in Nagaon and Karimganj, and hence, we will win two more seats''.
Sarma, however, did not elaborate on the remark.
Referring to the high-profile Dibrugarh constituency from where Union minister Sarbananda Sonowal is contesting, the CM said it will be a ''walkover for him and he will win by over three lakh votes''.
Dhubri, a minority-dominated constituency, is the only seat that the BJP will not win, he claimed.
