CoMSO rejects Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2019

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaDecember 6, 2019

SHILLONG: The Confederation of Meghalaya Social Organization (CoMSO) has rejected the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2019 alleging the Centre has failed to exempt Meghalaya from its ambit.

Chairman of the confederation Robertjune Kharjahrin on Friday said the new CAB is not acceptable as entire Meghalaya is not exempted.

“On this point, the CoMSO reject the CAB, 2019 and we demand that this Bill should not be passed,” Kharjahrin said in a statement issued here.

He also said that only three tribal areas of Assam are exempted, while Manipur is entirely under CAB and tribal areas of Tripura is also not exempted.

The CAB, 2019 seeks to provide Indian nationality to Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, Parsis, Jains and Buddhists fleeing persecution in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.

Stating that Meghalaya is a state without Inner Line Permit (ILP) system, Kharjahrin further slammed the Governor Tathagata Roy for delaying to grant his assent to the Meghalaya Residents Safety and Security (Amendment) Ordinance, 2019.

“The Governor did not give his assent to the Meghalaya Residents Safety and Security (Amendment) Ordinance, 2019 so Meghalaya will be a safe heaven for Bangladeshi original who became Indian citizens through the CAB,” he said.

Kharjahrin also said that the decision of the Centre to reduce the number of years from 11 years to 5 years in order to enable the Bangladeshi Hindu to get citizenship by naturalization still remain and this not been exempted.

“Now any Hindu Bangladeshi if they came in India only after 5 year they will be Indian citizen. It’s just a matter of five year where the 2 crore Bangladeshi Hindu and other will be Indians,” he added.