Sunday | 12 January 2025 | Reg No- 06
বাংলা
   
Sunday | 12 January 2025 | Epaper

Jack Of All Trades

Is BD worried of Indian issues?

Published : Wednesday, 1 January, 2020 at 12:00 AM  Count : 590
Nizam Ahmed
Nizam Ahmed

Nizam Ahmed

When most people and many political parties in India are worried over the enactment of the controversial Citizenship Act (CAA) and the subsequent eruption of the deadly protests in some of the big cities of the country,  Bangladesh government has been maintaining an absurd silence lest it closest friend gets embarrassed. On the same ground Bangladesh is also reluctant to pass any comments on the National Register of Citizens (NRC) published recently in Assam.

According to the CAA, Hindu, Christian, Buddhist, Jain, Sikh and Parsi migrants who have entered India illegally before December 31, 2014 from the Muslim-majority countries of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh and have stayed in the country for five years, are eligible to apply for Indian citizenship. Concerned quarter question that why is the provision extended only to people of six religions, and not Muslims, and why does it apply only to people coming from these three countries?

But the Indian government claims that people of these six faiths have faced persecution in these three Islamic countries, Muslims haven't. It is, therefore, India's moral obligation to provide them shelter. So, is the provision open only to those who have been persecuted in the three countries?

The NRC is a count of legitimate Indian citizens. Barring the state of Assam, this exercise has never been done anywhere in the country. India Home Minister Amit Shah has said he will frame a nationwide NRC by 2024 to detect illegal migrants. However, on December 22, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said his government had never said anything about an NRC except in Assam.

As both the CAA and the NRC are detrimental to Bangladesh at least in the long run, the concerned quarters and the general people expected a sort of precautionary reaction from the Bangladesh government which however, vehemently termed the issues as India's internal affairs.

More than 20 people have been killed and scores were injured in clashes with police in different cities of India as thousands of protesters fought street battles against police.
The absurd silence by Bangladesh which is likely to be affected or has begun to be affected by NRC and the looming threat of the CAA, has tainted the government as the not only pro Indian but also pro (Indian Prime Minister) Modi and his alleged communal Bharatiya Janata Party.

NRC has been published in the northeastern state of Assam and such list of so called bona-fide citizens are likely to be prepared in other Indian states especially in the northeast India adjacent to Bangladesh. It is feared that the NRC might compel the people excluded from the register to take refuge in Bangladesh, which is already suffering a lot due to the presence of more than a million forcibly displaced Rohingyas from Myanmar.
Concerned quarters fear that CAA may also allure Bangladesh's minority groups to go to India and become its citizens. Though Bangladesh will lose nothing if anyone migrates to any other country, such migration of religious minority groups might tarnish the image of Bangladesh as repressive state.

Following the publication of NRC in Assam, dozens of people either have intruded in to Bangladesh or were pushed into Bangladesh business the Border Security Force (BSF) of India. Different media in Bangladesh said BSF had pushed in several hundred people over the past months. The Indian people who intruded themselves or pushed in from India have arrested

Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen last week said those who had entered Bangladesh in recent weeks from India will be sent back if they are not Bangladeshis. With this statement the Foreign Minister has acknowledged that many people after being excluded from NRC, in Assam have crossed over or pushed in to Bangladesh.

When there are several instance of pushed in of some people from India by BSF over the past months, Bangladesh Foreign Minister still has confidence in Indian government that it would not push in anyone to Bangladesh. He said last week that "Indian government informed (Bangladesh) that they would not forcefully pushback anyone."

Besides the Foreign Minister showing his loyalty to the Indian government said his country was ready to bring back if any Bangladeshi was found in India illegally. Concerned quarters have rated this statement of the Foreign Minister as blunder, because it might entice the Indian government to assert that most people excluded from NRC of Assam are rooted in Bangladesh from where they had migrated time to time.
The Foreign Minister also said any Bangladeshis found to be living illegally in India will be taken back after proper verification.

"If any Bangladeshi found living in India illegally, then they will be returned back through legal process and after scrutiny. This was also informed to India," said the Foreign Minister.

Most of the 1.9 million people left out of NRC in Assam are in fact those who had migrated from Bangladesh since 1971. Many of them sold out their properties while leaving Bangladesh, but still they can trace out their villages and kith and kin in Bangladesh. So there are ample chances that India might claim those who missed the NRC as the migrants from Bangladesh.

Foreign minister AK Abdul Momen again said on Sunday that Bangladesh will take back only those who may have recently gone to India. "Those who have been living in India for 30 or 40 years are Indians. It will not be possible for us to accept them.... We can take back those who might have gone recently," he told India's news magazine, The Week. However, he was bold enough to tell the magazine that the CAA could weaken India's secular character.  He also challenged India's home minister Amit Shah's allegation that minorities faced persecution in Bangladesh.

Concerned civic society leaders fear with grave concern that CAA and NRC may affect Bangladesh seriously in future and the country should be prepared to cope up with the stresses.   However, Bangladesh Border Guard chief Maj Gen Shafeenul Islam told reporters in New Delhi following BGB-BSG biennial conference on Sunday that NRC is an internal affair of India but nobody would be allowed to enter Bangladesh illegally. He said the BGB would continue to work to prevent illegal crossings into India.

Bangladesh as the victim of circumstances will have to strengthen its diplomacy for a new challenge from Indian government, which in order to materialise its own politics based on religious extremism is out to trigger instability in the entire South Asia.
Concerned quarter speculate that like the issue of the Rohinhya persecution in Myanmar, India's political gambling with minority citizens will emerge as a new global issue which is likely to shatter its secular and democratic image.

The author is Business Editor, The Daily Observer


LATEST NEWS
MOST READ
Also read
2019 marked a rise in border killings
China’s sea claims to face stiff test in 2020
India’s rising surge of ‘Hindu’ nationalism!
Renewable energy next important global power source
Is BD worried of Indian issues?
Single digit interest rate dilemma
The other side of growth and some thoughts for new year
Finance and more for SME
Editor : Iqbal Sobhan Chowdhury
Published by the Editor on behalf of the Observer Ltd. from Globe Printers, 24/A, New Eskaton Road, Ramna, Dhaka.
Editorial, News and Commercial Offices : Aziz Bhaban (2nd floor), 93, Motijheel C/A, Dhaka-1000.
Phone: PABX- 41053001-06; Online: 41053014; Advertisement: 41053012.
E-mail: district@dailyobserverbd.com, news©dailyobserverbd.com, advertisement©dailyobserverbd.com, For Online Edition: mailobserverbd©gmail.com
🔝
close