“We are firm in our promise to refugees. There was some delay in framing of the rules, but the process is going on now. They will be ready in a month, after which we will be able to start its implementation. January-end is our target,” Vijayvargiya, who is also in-charge of West Bengal BJP unit told ET.
Accusing the TMC government of not being sympathetic to the refugees’ cause, he said the CAA will “change the lives of many members of the Matua, Namasudra and Rajbhanshi communities who don’t have citizenship of India, despite having come here many years ago”.
“Many of them face a lot of trouble. They cannot apply for a passport, have difficulty even getting a basic certificate. CAA will grant them permanent citizenship… this is the PM’s gift to them,” he said. The TMC’s “appeasement policy” is clear to the state’s voters, while the BJP “was only trying to ensure that its promises are met”.
The Citizenship (Amendment) Act that seeks to grant citizenship to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Christian, Jain and Parsi refugees, who have come to India from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan on or before 31 December, 2014, was passed by Parliament in December last year and also notified, but the Centre is yet to frame rules under the Act.
In August, the government applied for a three-month extension. BJP president Jagat Prakash Nadda had cited the Covid-19 pandemic as the reason for the delay.
In January this year, the TMC-led state assembly had passed a resolution against CAA with CM Mamata Banerjee saying that CAA and NRC would be enacted “over her dead body”.
With CAA, the BJP is targetting a section of Dalits called Namasudra (Hindu Dalit) community in Bengal who are believed to have migrated from Bangladesh, erstwhile East Pakistan, after 1971. While most Matuas have enrolled their names in the state’s voters’ list, the existing government records have registered them as refugees and infiltrators. A section of the community has been complaining that voter-ID cards are not sufficient for them to get passports or caste certificates.
State minister Firhad Hakim of the TMC responded to Vijayvargiya’s remark and said the BJP is trying to fool the people of West Bengal. “If the Matuas are not citizens, how come they voted in the assembly and parliamentary polls year after year? The BJP should stop fooling the people of West Bengal,” he added.
Calcutta University political science professor Dipankar Sinha said the move is likely to consolidate the minority voters in favour of Trinamool, but is also intended to “raise the pitch of the threat of illegal infiltration in the state, particularly among the Bengali middle classes”.
“We cannot say that this will consolidate Hindu votes in favour of BJP as yet, because there are many factors with respect to a party’s organisational outreach and overall governance that will play a role this time.”