Designed to polarise polls, manage headlines: Congress questions CAA rules notification timing

New Delhi: The Congress on Monday alleged that the timing of notifying the rules for the Citizenship (Amendment) Act is evidently designed to polarise the coming Lok Sabha elections, especially in West Bengal and Assam.

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh also alleged that the announcement is yet another attempt to “manage the headlines” after the Supreme Court’s strictures on the electoral bonds issue.

Ramesh said it has taken four years and three months for the Narendra Modi government to notify the rules for the law cleared by Parliament in December 2019.

“After seeking nine extensions for the notification of the rules, the timing right before the elections is evidently designed to polarise the elections, especially in West Bengal and Assam,” the Congress leader said.

“The prime minister claims that his government works in a business-like and time-bound manner. The time taken to notify the rules for the CAA is yet another demonstration of the prime minister’s blatant lies,” he said in a post on X.

The rules for implementation of the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) 2019 were notified on Monday, paving the way for granting citizenship to undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan, according to officials.

With the CAA rules being issued, the Modi government will now start granting Indian nationality to persecuted non-Muslim migrants from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who came to India till December 31, 2014. These include Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians.

The CAA was passed in December 2019 and subsequently got the president’s assent but there were protests in several parts of the country against it. Over a hundred people lost their lives during the anti-CAA protests or police action.

The law could not come into effect as rules had not been notified till now.