Mamata will be a ‘political refugee’ in West Bengal

In a virtual launch of the Bharatiya Janata Party's campaign for next year's assembly elections in West Bengal, Indian Home Minister Amit Shah yesterday raised the issue of amended Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and attacked Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for her opposition to the law.

Addressing an online rally of party workers, Shah said Mamata had only put up a "token" resistance to the amended CAA and asked her to give a point-by-point elaboration of her stand.   

"The people of Bengal will reduce Mamata Banerjee to a political refugee because of her stand on CAA," Shah said.

The amended CAA seeks to give Indian citizenship to Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Jain, Parsi and Sikh refugees who have migrated from Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan till 2014.

Mamata-led Trinamool Congress and other opposition parties of India termed the amendment as "discriminatory" to Muslims, a charge denied by the Indian government which maintains that all Muslims who are citizens of India would continue to be so.

The opposition to the amended CAA, passed by both Houses of Indian parliament in December last year, had seen weeks of nationwide street protests, often marred by violence and police action that left scores dead, before the Covid-19 pandemic put a brake on it.

On May 30, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to mark the completion of one year in power in his second successive stint in the top post,  had cited the amended CAA as one of the major achievements of his government, terming it as an "expression of India's compassion and spirit of inclusiveness".

Amit Shah, at yesterday's online rally, said the name "Corona Express" given by Mamata to trains carrying thousands of migrant workers back to West Bengal from other parts of India post-Covid-19, would become her "exit route" from the state.

"The name 'Corona Express' that you have given, Mamata didi, will become your exit route. You've added salt to the wounds of the migrant workers and they will not forget this," Shah said addressing BJP workers online.

Shah was referring to Mamata Banerjee's criticism of the central government for running migrant special trains amid a surge in coronavirus cases across India.

"They are stuffing the Shramik trains full of people, there is no social distancing, no food, no water, nothing," the Chief Minister had said. "What are they trying to do? Are they running Shramik trains or are they trying to run Corona Express," she had added during a media briefing.

Banerjee and Amit Shah have sparred bitterly throughout the coronavirus crisis and the lockdown accusing the Central government of undermining her state government's efforts.

Shah said the BJP may have won 303 seats in Lok Sabha polls last year "but for me most, the important are 18 seats we pocketed in Bengal."