The affidavit, filed by B C Joshi, Director in the Ministry of Home Affairs, said the CAA does not confer any arbitrary and unguided powers on the executive as the citizenship to the persecuted minorities of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh would be granted in a manner as specified under the law governing grant of citizenship.
The contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2019 (CAB), which generated widespread protests in the north-eastern states, is expected to be tabled in the Lok Sabha on Monday for consideration and passage.
On December 4, the Union Cabinet cleared the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill that seeks to grant citizenship to non-Muslim refugees from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan if they faced religious persecution there. The government intends to introduce bill in Parliament's Winter Session next week. What is this legislation and why is it contentious?
"The process of NRC will be carried out across the country. No one irrespective of their religion should be worried. It is just a process to get everyone under the NRC," the Union home minister said replying to a supplementary during Question Hour in the Upper House.
The citizens urged the central government to look into the ongoing protests with all seriousness and safeguard the democratic institutions of the country, and take stern action against those people behind them.
A senior State Department official, on condition of anonymity, said that he has met with officials in India about what is taking place in the nation and expressed concern. The US has also 'expressed desire first to try to help and work through some of these issues', the official said.
The bench said it will hear petitions pertaining to Assam and Tripura separately as the problem with CAA in these two states is different from rest of the country.
An 8-member delegation of protesters submitted a memorandum of their demands, including withdrawal of the CAA, to the L-G. The L-G appealed to them to call off their agitation as it has been 'causing inconvenience to schoolchildren, patients and general public'.
A bench headed by Chief Justice S A Bobde said it will hear the transfer petition of the Centre on January 10.
Virat Kohli made it clear that he will not like to get embroiled in a controversy by commenting on a subject that he is not well aware of.
In a statement issued on Monday, the US Commission for International Religious Freedom said that it was deeply troubled over the passage of the bill in Lok Sabha.
"We're aware that the lower and upper houses of the Indian Parliament have passed the Citizenship Amendment Bill, and we're also aware of the concerns that have been publicly expressed. The United Nations is closely analysing the possible consequences of the law," Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General Farhan Haq said on Thursday during the daily press briefing.
Krishan Attri, the British army's first Hindu chaplain, uses extracts from the Mahabharata to counsel British soldiers going to war in Iraq or Afghanistan. Attri uses the Bhagwad Gita to explain the necessity of going to war to British Hindu soldiers deputed in Iraq or Afghanistan. There are 470 Hindus in Britain's armed forces.
"You write injustice on earth, We will write revolution in the sky; Everything will be remembered, Everything recorded," he recited from the poem.
Those leaving were mostly engaged as masons, maids and housekeepers in the country, another BSF official said.
'There's no going back on this protest till the CAA is repealed and the government assures of dropping the NRC proposal'
The SC issued notice to the Centre on the batch of pleas seeking stay on the operation of the law.
Giving final touches to its most ambitious plan to build a wide network of new silk roads on land and seas to enhance global connectivity, China has invited India to join President Xi Jinping's pet project that would revive the ancient trade route and benefit the region.
AASU, Cong MP Jairam Ramesh, TMC MP Mahua Moitra, and several NGOs have filed petitions against the act that was assented to by the President yesterday.
Professor Dr Abrar Ahmed, however, said his tweet had been 'misunderstood' and he had posted it as a 'satire' on how minorities are being 'targeted' by the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA).
Speaking at the Annual Prime Minister's National Cadet Corps Rally 2020, Modi said the problem in Jammu and Kashmir persisted since Independence and some families and political parties kept issues in the region "alive", as a result of which terrorism thrived there.
B'desh minister termed as "untrue" the allegations of minority repression in the country.
The CAA does not change basic structure of Constitution, MEA spokesperson said at a media briefing.
India previously rejected the US religious freedom report, saying it sees no locus standi for a foreign government to pronounce on the state of its citizens' constitutionally protected rights.
'People belonging to all religions reside in our country and this is our strength that they stay together as a team. Why should you exclude (them)?'
'PM Modi, please come to Shaheen Bagh, collect your gift and talk to us'
'The entire brouhaha with regard to the CAB smacks of blatant Hinduphobia, a duplicitous exercise, morally corrupt in its construct and aimed at divesting deserving Hindus of basic human rights by raising the bogey of Muslim discrimination, and must be called out for what it is,' says Vivek Gumaste.
A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India S A Bobde, hearing a petition filed by lawyer Vineet Dhanda seeking stern legal action against those disturbing peace and harmony in the country in the name of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, said, "The country is going through a critical time, the endeavour must be to bring peace and such petitions do not help."
Addressing a rally in support of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act in Kanpur, Adityanath said, "These people do not have courage to participate in the protests themselves. They know if they indulge in vandalism, their property will be seized. Now what have they done? "They started making the women sit at roads. The children have been made to sit. It's such a big crime that the men are sleeping under the quilt and the women are made to sit at roads. It is shameful," he said.
The Assam finance minister said that it is not possible for the person to go back to his country of origin and collect a copy of police report to show that he was subjected to religious persecution.
As the clock struck 12, the protesting crowd burst into a cheer to greet the fellow protesters the new year, and moments later broke into the national anthem in unison which was followed by the slogan 'Inquilab Zindabad'.
PIB seeks to 'bust myths' around the citizenship bill, says the legislation is not against the interest of indigenous people of Assam.
Anyone born in India before July 1, 1987 or whose parents were born before that date are bona fide Indian citizens according to law and need not worry due to the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 or a possible countrywide National Register of Citizens, a top government official said on Friday. According to the 2004 amendments of the Citizenship Act, people of the country, except those in Assam, whose one parent is an Indian and neither is an illegal immigrant are also considered Indian citizens.
India's trade with the Gulf-Arab region stands at $180 billion. India needs the Gulf region more in terms of trade, investments and employment than the other way round. When it comes to faith, the Gulf-Arab nations have not been found wanting at any point in time, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The statement came after chief ministers of West Bengal, Punjab, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh announced that the law is "unconstitutional" and has no place in their respective states.
'With the Citizenship Amendment Bill, Hindus from Pakistan can come to India. They have got a way,' says Gurumukh Jagwani who came to India on his honeymoon, loved the country so much that he stayed back and got Indian citizenship.
'Refusing to implement the CAA-NRC, as some states have done via resolutions in state assemblies, is a violation of the Constitution; an attempt to alter the fundamental structure of our democracy and a recipe for anarchy,' argues Vivek Gumaste.
The MHA put out a set of FAQs on the Act, seeking to counter a 'misinformation campaign'. It said the Act doesn't have anything to do with the deportation of any foreigner in India.
Addressing a rally in Lucknow in support of the CAA, Shah threw the challenge for the debate to Rahul Gandhi, Mamata Banerjee, Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati. He also declared that the construction of a Ram temple 'touching the skies' in Ayodhya will begin within three months.
Khan, who was the Chief Guest at the function, was addressing the delegates, when he touched upon the protests over CAA referred to by two earlier speakers. This led to the objections being raised by some delegates at the venue.