BENGALURU: Over 2,000 women gathered at Town Hall on Thursday to raise their voice against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National Register of Citizens and the National Population Register (NPR).
Homemakers, professionals and members of various NGOs gathered under the umbrella of Women India Movement to express their opinion against the government and its steps to “divide the people on the basis of religions”, instead of addressing issues like poverty and unemployment and the falling GDP growth.
As it was a Christmas vacation, children and college students accompanied their mothers to the protest site.
They raised slogans against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa and Member of Parliament Tejasvi Surya.
The event was mostly peaceful, except for an instance where a man, supporting the CAA, entered the protest site with a placard stating ‘Women will destroy the Hindu rashtra’.
But the police removed him from the protest site.
Taking a cue from Delhi, a young girl gave red roses to police officers.
Lubina Siraj, vice president of National Women Front, said the struggle is “save the Constitution.
“We are here to make people understand that the Act has been passed and it is not what was written by Dr B R Ambedkar in the Constitution. It is a fascist government. The statement given by the PM that Muslims will stay and not be harmed cannot be believed. The PM says NRC will not come, but the home minister says something else. They should first sit together and decide what they want to tell people.”
Some others like Kavitha Reddy representing ‘We the People of India’ group joined the protest in support of the students and civilians who were “attacked by the police” in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Mangaluru.
“Many people in north Karnataka and Kerala lost their documents in the floods. How will the government help them?” Reddy said.
The agitators also expressed their fear about detention centres comparing them to gas chambers of Nazi Germany. They said people were already being sent to them.