Indian Americans rallied in several cities in the United States Saturday to counter what they say is a disinformation campaign against the Citizenship Amendment Act or CAA, reports India West.
The act gives the right of citizenship in India to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian communities who faced religious persecution in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. It’s been criticized by some for its exclusion of Muslims and protests have been held in both India and the United States against it.
Recently rallies were held in Chicago, Seattle and Atlanta in support of the Amendment from the Modi government.
“What people fail to see is that the CAA has a limited scope in that it is meant to simply rehabilitate those persecuted minorities already in India, but who were left behind on the other side during the 1947 partition for no fault of theirs,” Archana Sunil, a health and medicare insurance adviser, said to ANI News.
“India is our motherland,” said another protestor to ANI News. “We are extremely passionate about it and can’t tolerate anybody who is spreading lies and hatred against India to destroy its secular image.”
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The Indian American Muslim Council and the Bay Area Coalition of Concerned Citizens are among groups in the United States opposing CAA.
“Just like the immigrants are being discriminated and criminalized in the US, similarly the Muslims and other minorities in India are being criminalized because of the NRC (National Register of Citizens) ,” said Alonso Espinosa from MIT Students Against War (MITSAW). “Our struggles are very similar and we have to fight these oppressive powers together.”
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RE: Pro-CAA rallies held by Indian Americans in several US Cities: disgusting that they single out muslims to be excluded.
India is also planning on having a national register of citizens, the documents required to prove citizenship by people is almost impossible for those in villages.