New Delhi, Jan 8: Amid regular debate whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP leadership have done better in Assam vis-s-vis ensuing parliamentary elections by piloting the controversial The Citizenship Amendment Bill, opposition lawmakers have cautioned the government of the consequences.
"I state with great disappointment that this Bill is nothing but a futile exercise and at best NRC- part 2," said Congress MP Sushmita Dev.
In her note of dissent to the Bill as a member of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the draft law, Ms Dev says that the Bill in its present form "will in all likelihood clash with Article 14 of the Constitution and Clause 5 of the Assam Accord".
Her party colleague, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury shared similar sentiments and said - the bill has the potentialities of generating "ethnic linguistic animosity" in the state of Assam.
The Marxist MP Mohammad Salim maintained in his note of dissent that this amendment Bill "does not offer solutions to the issues and problems that the country is facing". He cautioned that the new proposed law will actually create more problems.
"The Machiavellian aims and ideology behind the proposed Bill as it stands shows that fundamentals have changed and being changed without democratic debate," he said.
Trinamool MPs and Saugata Roy and Derek O' Brien in identical note of dissent say: "We feel that no names of genuine Indian citizens should have been deleted we also strongly feel that the bill should not be past by mere majority since this is a political effort not necessitated by political realities in Assam and West Bengal".
Bhartuhari Mahatab, the BJD floor leader in Lok Sabha, in his note of dissent said - "The population density in Assam is very high and if the present Bill is enacted and brought into force, illegal immigrants who have entered Assam and built their residences in the state and even encroached upon government land will become entitled to Indian citizenship. In an already densely populated state, this will open floodgates thereby accentuating the discontent among the people of Assam"