Religion is a personal and social affiliation, and no religion should lead anyone to hate others from a different faith. However, in an expansive society like India, there are always those who swing to extremes in everything they think and do, and it’s natural that social harmony gets negatively impacted by these individuals and groups. India is a secular nation by Constitution and law. It doesn’t matter which party is in power, the State can’t discriminate on the basis of religion and work against or towards one religion. However, the Constitution has provided for reasonable classification for taking affirmative action to empower the socially and economically marginalised.
Religious minority reservations, special constitutional commissions on the basis of caste, creed and religion were being enacted as legislations for quite long in this nation. If a nation wishes to utilise the same provision to enact a limited legislation to fulfil a national agenda due for 70 long years, it can’t be unconstitutional. In fact CAA is not just Constitutional, it’s also legal, ethical and humane. One group representing a religion or a caste can’t demand their inclusion in a national legislation, only pointing at the larger canvas of constitutional secularism, when a limited, one-time, time-locked, empathetic and socially empowering legislation like Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 is passed with due parliamentary process. The opposition to this legislation is politically motivated and their agenda is being driven through unethical means of spreading lies and twisting facts by Congress party, TMC, AIMIM, TRS, Communist parties and others across the nation.
Large rallies, violent protests, arson by university students, partisan physical attacks by these parties against CAA, especially showcasing Indian Muslims as participants, is a poisonous political plot. It is gradually leading to feelings of hurt and bitterness amongst majority Hindus, that their fellow citizens, Indian Muslims, are opposing a small act of generosity by the Narendra Modi government to Hindu refugees. These are people who migrated to India on the grounds of religious persecution and have been living in distraught social condition for years. Indian Muslims have lived in complete harmony in India with Hindus for centuries, not just after India attained freedom. And this nation has become a constitutionally secular nation. India hasn’t turned ‘secular’ overnight after Congress leader Indira Gandhi unconstitutionally inserted the ‘secular’ word into the preamble of the Constitution during the emergency period between 1975-77.
India has been a tolerant nation since vedic civilization and time immemorial, as Hindus the primal inhabitants of this land were led by universalism, knowledge, security, magnanimity and tolerance. However, the consistent onslaught of foreign rulers for over four centuries, and continuous onslaught on Indian culture even after Independence, has unsettled the legacy of this nation. Congress party has made a historic blunder by allowing partitioning of India on religious lines to suit the selfish power politics of Jawaharlal Nehru in 1947.
Since 2014 after losing substantial power both at the Centre and across the nation, the Congress along with its regional minions is at it again. The Congress is spearheading politics of national disintegration by manufacturing baseless dissent, pointless crusade against CAA by sponsoring and funding poisonous politics of inter-religious division across the nation.
These political forces are once again trying to create an emotional division amongst Hindus and Muslims and propagating misinformation for their petty political power games. Indian Hindus and Muslims should understand the political agenda of the Congress party and its regional subsidiaries. They must not fall for this divisive strategy of inter-religious conflict. BJP stands for India, not for any singular religion, the ideology of BJP is ‘Nation First’.
Congress at fault
The Congress is spearheading the politics of national disintegration by manufacturing baseless dissent and pointless crusade against CAA by sponsoring and funding poisonous politics of inter-religious division across the nation. These political forces are once again trying to create an emotional division among Hindus and Muslims and propagating misinformation for their petty games
(Author K Krishna Saagar Rao is the Chief Spokesperson of Telangana BJP. He is also an Organisational Strategist and a Global Leadership Coach.)