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So many things absolutely wrong about your comment..

Indian National Congress is center-left. The party in power (BJP) is extreme right.

The protests are because of this act being tied with the impending National Registry of Citizens which will strip many Indians of their citizenship (this already took place in the state of Assam)

The BJP discovered that under the NRC rules used to decide if you are a citizen or not, a lot of Hindus were stripped of their citizenship, more so than the Muslims they were targetting.

This CAA which folks are protesting against will just reclassify Non Muslims who will be stripped of their citizenship by the NRC, as citizens (assumed to be refugees) and will leave many existing Muslim citizens who have been in India since 100s of years / multiple generations stateless.

Judging by your comment, the BJP has done an excellent job packaging the CAA as an act that merely helps (Non Muslim) refugees from other countries, and has succeeded in pulling the hood over a large number of people (especially NRIs)

Same thing which Manmohan Singh proposed back in 2003

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/videos/news/when-manmoha...

It would have seen the same outpouring of outrage. What's your point?

The point is that the same people that proposed this are now protesting against it. Makes you wonder why?

> people that proposed this are now protesting against it.

Don't paint this as an opposition fueled protest. It is an anti-government protest by ordinary citizens who deeply care about secularism as espoused by the constitution. These would have happened then, as they have happened now.

https://www.outlookindia.com/newsscroll/cpim-batted-for-cab-...

Why do they disagree with it now?

Mr Singh never said leave Muslims out of CAA.

Have you read the bill? When someone says "minorities facing persecution from countries like Bangladesh" what does it mean?

Speaking of links, here's a screenshot of a tweet that the BJP deleted today: https://gumlet.assettype.com/thequint%2F2019-12%2Fec8b77a6-8...

Says everything about their true intentions, the reason that everyone is protesting

This is just bullshit. The opposition hasn't been able to mobilise a single popular protest against the government in the last 5 years, how could they do this now? These are spontaneous protests organised by ordinary people across the whole country. Open your eyes and stop spreading government propaganda.

Violent protests are often organized by politicians. I won't blame Congress because I don't have proof. However, it's not something completely unheard of.

> This is purely Indian National Congress (GOP of India and currently out of power) driven rioting.

Ref? I have one for you: BJP members arrested for rioting wearing Muslim outfits, https://thewire.in/communalism/murshidabad-bjp-lungi-skullca... So, that rules out purely INC driven rioting.

> It does not have mass public support but being made to look like one.

The BJP led government shutdown the internet and imposed section 144 in various parts of the country essentially denying the right to organise and protest, and in two cities, the police open fired on unarmed civilians, killing 3. It can't get bigger than that. It hasn't been made to look-like anything than what it really is.

> Muslims, by spreading misinformation that the act is somehow against them.

https://www.reddit.com/r/india/comments/ebdeup/an_attempt_to...

> In case you are not aware how minorities in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan have been treated, following is just the tip of iceberg

You know what they say about getting your own house in order? India has so many internal issues that the amount of spending required to enforce CAA is beyond bonkers. How about India sign the 1951 UN convention for refugees, instead: https://www.unhcr.org/1951-refugee-convention.html I'm sure you'd support that, given how worried you're with humanitarian crisis on the other side of the border.

...and the audacity to end the post with mis-information and deflection with not a single link supporting the baseless accusations and claims from the first three-quarters of your post is astounding.

> Congress party is inciting violence, particularly among Muslims

> This is purely Indian National Congress (GOP of India and currently out of power) driven rioting

No proof, just claims

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> Don't quote CAA without NRC.

Why not? They are two very separate things. Infact, CAA can be applied without the NRC. There is no compulsion that CAA has to be followed by the NRC.

> CAA along with NRC is an anti-poor, anti-muslim law.

You do know that the current government has done the most out of the past governments for the poor and muslims, right? The Ayushman Bharat scheme has been successfully providing free healthcare to the poorest of the people. The triple talaq law gives muslim women the same civil and divorce laws that the women of other religions enjoy in India for decades. Interestingly, the political parties that are right now going on about minority rights where the one opposing the triple talaq act in parliament. Make what you will of that

Current govt caused the recession. The damage demonetisation did (especially to the poor) is painfully obvious. No significant upside. The reduction in economic activity was so pronounced that satellite images could pick up on it. Growth rate tanked. It's now lower than that of Pakistan which is ironic considering how much the current regime likes to use them as a distraction.

They're also responsible for the longest and the most number of internet shutdowns in the history of any democracy (It's still going on). Horrible civil rights record.

Minorities are definitely not better off. Statements like that are just propaganda.

Agree with the part about damage caused by demonetization.

>>Growth rate tanked. It's now lower than that of Pakistan which is ironic considering how much the current regime likes to use them as a distraction.

This, I disagree with. Do you have references?

>> Minorities are definitely not better off. Statements like that are just propaganda.

Which minorities? Citation needed.

https://www.news18.com/news/business/indias-gdp-growth-hits-...

This was a few months ago. India's annual growth rate is still higher than Pakistan's. https://www.reuters.com/article/india-economy-gdp/update-2-i...

All minorities: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/20/world/asia/india-muslims-...

> Current govt caused the recession. The damage demonetisation did (especially to the poor) is painfully obvious. No significant upside. The reduction in economic activity was so pronounced that satellite images could pick up on it. Growth rate tanked. It's now lower than that of Pakistan which is ironic considering how much the current regime like to use them as a distraction.

Could you share any references for this?

This planet money episode explains it pretty well. https://www.npr.org/2019/09/25/764433918/episode-770-when-in...

NBER report: https://scholar.harvard.edu/gopinath/publications/cash-and-e...

Thank you for sharing.

Another important thing to note about NRC is that it hasn't been tabled yet. It's not clear if the parameters like documents required and the cut-off date will be the same for pan-India NRC.

While NRC is clearly present in BJP's manifesto, there's no clear timeline available for it[1]. The one conducted in Assam took almost six years to prepare and a lot of money (which the Government may not have).

1. https://theprint.in/india/govt-has-no-plan-in-place-for-nati...

> You do know that the current government has done the most out of the past governments for the poor and muslims, right?

You mean to say 60yrs of governance that came before did less than what the current government has done in 6yrs? That's quite a claim and the onus of its proof, I'm afraid, is rightly on your shoulders. And no, just a single example each of Ayushman Bharat and Triple Talak doesn't count. I demand more: extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. You'd probably have to write a book (or rewrite books).

> There is no compulsion that CAA has to be followed by the NRC.

That's not what the ruling party has said. The Home Minister is on-record that NRC would follow CAA and promised to implement it by 2024 [0] to drive-out illegal immigrants, for some convenient definition of an illegal immigrant as defined by the CAA, which is just limited to the Muslims. Make what you will of that.

[0] https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/nrc-process-to-be-car...

BJP's official philosophy is that India should be a Hindu-dominated country, Islam is the enemy of the Hindus, and all means necessary should be undertaken to suppress the Muslims. As you know perfectly well.

Not true. The official policy is "Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas", translated to "with everyone, for everyone's progress", key being "everyone". I would like to see references to the policy that states "Islam is the enemy of the Hindus, and all means necessary should be undertaken to suppress the Muslims".

But if you read about its view of history, or look at its policies, it is clearly Hindu supremicist. The BJP pretends to be more liberal than it is because it knows the world would strongly disapprove if it knew the truth.

More specifically, what do you think of the Kashmir situation, such as the internet shutdown, which has been going on for 3 months? Is it your view that the great majority of citizens there approve of the abolition of autonomy because it will aid economic development?

The level insidiousness needed to use asylum as a way to undermine India's secularism is something only the BJP(right-wing hindu nationalist) can have.

People fleeing persecution can obviously be sheltered in a nonsectarian manner.

I didn't realise the BJP IT cell monitors hacker news! If I was Amit Shah, I'd give you raise. But I have a moral compass, so I could never be an Amit Shah. Whew!

You have to consider CAA+NRC (National register for citizens). You have to consider both. We are the only country that is saying that your residency is under suspicion unless proven otherwise. Let that sink in for just a moment.

CAA/NRC affects the poorest people -- think of the tens of millions of migrant land labourers or unlettered widows and unmarried women for a start -- who do not have documents. There are 1.9 million in Assam alone who find themselves unable to prove they belong. Embarassingly for this unembarassable govt, a large majority of the excluded are Hindus (!). If they cannot submit proof of residence, they will be put in detention camps. The non-Muslims (mostly Hindus) will be reabsorbed; I don't know how. How will they identify the muslim? The males could pull down their pants, I presume. Sigh.

So the Muslims -- that comprise a huge fraction of the remaining mass -- will either be detained or deported, regardless of whether they have lived here all their lives or not. The family of an ex-President of India couldn't find their names on the acceptable list. We can't even keep electoral rolls stable; every time there's an election, someone or the other from my family is missing from the list.

But they can't be deported, because no country will take them. The best we can hope is that there will be reverse migration since Bangladesh has dramatically improved its health stats and sanitation.

The upshot is that we are going to be enslaving large numbers of Muslims in detention centres. The people building these centres will likely be the first 'clients'. You can put up all the links you want about persecution of Hindus and I agree that they should be given a fair hearing. But your defence is classic whataboutery. "They did it to us". BJP has become militantly anti-muslim. This is not the only example.

> If you change the context by replacing "India" with "USA", act will transform into giving shelter to persecuted people in Latin America.

BULLSHIT. CAA is like giving shelter to "non-latinos". Rohingya muslims in Mynamar, Ahmadiyas from Pak, Saudi teen girls escaping their families hold on them, atheists in Iran, they have all been banned from consideration. Don't speak of tolerance.

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What interests me is what happens if my name is not on the NRC? What are they going to be able to do? Are they going to ask me for my newly minted internal passport every time I admit my kid to school, or go to the hospital or shop or open an account? Is this going to be the new Aadhar card?

They never thought this through at all, did they?

>> I didn't realise the BJP IT cell monitors hacker news.

Not an IT cell member. Just a concerned Indian citizen who has seen and been affected by Indian vote-bank politics which grants a veto on public policy to minorities (specifically one minority). Is a community a minority if it is 25% of the population?

>> But I have a moral compass, so I could never be an Amit Shah. How very smug. Good for you.

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The Indian National Congress is left wing, how is it the GOP of India? The BJP is nationalist and religion based it is more like the GOP.

>It has nothing to do with Indian citizens

It has nothing to do with Indian citizens? A law passed in India does not concern Indian citizens? I am not sure I can make sense of what you are saying.

If you are saying that the law does not affect current citizens, then, I want to say that It does not have to to justify the protests. Because the protests are about how it drags religion into how citizenship is granted.

It discriminates people based on religion.

That itself, without going into anymore details, is enough reason to protest against it.

Now, there are some arguments that say we already have different laws for different religion casts etc. But that argument is shallow, misguided at best, blatantly malicious at worst.

Because such things are there because the idea of being secular overrides even having consistent laws. Because it allows people to practice their religion.

In other cases, were certain reservations are provided to people of certain cast, they are merly to target a subset of population that was victim of a bad cast system in the past.

You can see that both of these ideas are very much in the spirit of secularism, and in first case, even overrides the need for consistent laws.

This bill shatters that very idea, like to its core.

In a set of people in which all members have same attributes, except for their religion, it makes it much easier for people from certain religion to obtain citizenship.

Now, one can argue that the religion filter, as we saw in the second case above, is meant to target people who were fleeing from religious persecution. But that argument also does not help here. Because then it only helps people who are fleeing from religious persecution from being a Hindu, and it does not help if you are fleeing from religious persecution from being a Muslim.

And why drag religious persecution into the whole thing anyway, people are made to suffer for various reasons in a lot of places, many of which does not have to do with religion.

No, this "religious persecution" thing is a very clever way to mask the actual intent behind this act. And in fact, this religious persecution clause is not even present in the actual law [1].

And people are calling it out en masse.

[1] http://egazette.nic.in/WriteReadData/2019/214646.pdf

>> It discriminates people based on religion. >> Now, there are some arguments that say we already have different laws for different religion casts etc. But that argument is shallow, misguided at best, blatantly malicious at worst.

I respectfully submit that your argument is even shallower. There are separate personal laws for different communities, all non-Hindu communities have exemptions under various laws (Right to Education being one particularly damaging example, the Endowment Acts being another). All these laws discriminate against and put the majority community at a disadvantage vs. the minorities.

>> Because such things are there because the idea of being secular overrides even having consistent laws. Because it allows people to practice their religion.

This principle has allowed the policy-making process to be hijacked by vote-bank politics, in which every two-bit political party outdoes itself to woo minorities by offering sops, at the expense of the majority. Case-in-point: The Trinamool and Mamta Bannerjee.

>> Because then it only helps people who are fleeing from religious persecution from being a Hindu, and it does not help if you are fleeing from religious persecution from being a Muslim. Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan are Muslim-majority countries. By definition, you cannot be fleeing religious persecution. Offered without evidence: The only Muslim immigrants from these countries are economic immigrants, and there is no humanitarian imperative to offer them citizenship.

>> No, this "religious persecution" thing is a very clever way to mask the actual intent behind this act. And in fact, this religious persecution clause is not even present in the actual law [1].

The act is a set of directions to the government machinery. It does not have to explain itself, and certainly does not have to contain the words "religious persecution".