LEADERS of the CPI(M) held a series of public meetings in Delhi against the Constitutional (Amendment) Act and the proposed National Population Register(NPR) and the National Register of Citizens(NRC).

Sitaram Yechury, general secretary of the CPI(M) addressed public meetings in Khureji and Shaheen Bag, Delhi on January 25 and 26 respectively. Yechury said that the BJP is creating a dangerous situation in the country. The BJP is hell-bent on polarising the Indian people on communal lines and this is the prime reason that the CAA was brought in the country. The process of polarising the people on communal lines is since long, but recently, it started with the abrogation of main provisions of Article 370 and dividing the state of Jammu and Kashmir.

He said the Modi government has failed badly on the economic front; the growth in the economy has fallen down to less than 4 per cent, unemployment is the highest in the country in the last 40 years and the BJP is side-tracking these issues and instead polarising the people on communal lines. The CAA is a glaring example of such side-tracking, he said, where the Muslims are deliberately kept out of the citizenship to be awarded on the basis of persecution in the neighbouring countries. He castigated at the BJP and said why cannot it see the persecution of Muslims in Burma and why only Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh are considered to be nations that persecute its minorities. He mentioned nation-states like Srilanka, Bhutan and Burma also are neighbouring countries and they have been deliberately kept out of the persecution list of nations.

Yechury said, the BJP is left with only one agenda and that is to divide the people into communal lines. He also congratulated the people of the country for showing exemplary courage in exposing the sinister designs of the BJP government. In Shaheen Bag he said that the Left in Kerala organised a 620-kilometre-long human chain on January 26, which witnessed participation of more than 70 lakh people. Yechury called upon state governments to pass a resolution against the CAA as was done by the Kerala and Punjab assemblies.

Subhashini Ali, Polit Bureau member of the CPI(M) also addressed a meeting against the CAA at Hauz Rani in Delhi. She spoke about the atrocities committed by the BJP government on people in the state of UP. She said the modern laboratory of Hindutva rule is the state of UP. The chief minister of UP, Yogi Adityanath has used the police to intimidate people in the state. She said 24 people were killed in police firing and now it is all the more clear that the police fired to kill the innocent people as a majority of those killed were hit above their waist.

Hannan Mollah, Polit Bureau member of the Party also addressed a meeting in Shaheen Bag on January 29. He castigated at the BJP government for deliberately creating this binary between Hindus and Muslims. He said the BJP is also trying to polarise the Delhi assembly elections on communal lines. He said recently a central minister was seen shouting slogans of killing the people in an election rally in Delhi. This is ample proof of what the Shah-Modi duo team is up to. They want to create a situation which is extremely fluid so that the people vote on issues other than economic.