A day after the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2019 was passed in Rajya Sabha, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) general secretary Bhaiyyaji Joshi on Thursday congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah on the passage of Bill.
Joshi said that the stand of the RSS has always been that a Hindu, who comes to India because of persecution in another country, cannot be termed as an intruder, but a refugee.
“There is a need for these refugees to have a respectable life and common rights in our country. But, a lot of time passed and these refugees had to wait,” he added.
He also said it is a “courageous step” and thanked the government, the prime minister and the home minister.
“The present government has taken a very good step and the minority communities from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh will get a respectable place in India,” he said.
Joshi asserted that the Bill provides an assurance of respectable life to the refugees who come to India.
The Bill which amended the decades-old Citizenship Bill 1955, and provides citizenship to non-muslims from Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, was passed in Lok Sabha on a little past midnight of Tuesday and in Rajya Sabha on Wednesday. The Bill will now soon be a law, once the President will give his assent.
Meanwhile, the a massive protests broke out in Assam and Tripura as well as some other parts of northeast due to the Bill and locals there feel that the Bill will disturb their arrangements with granting citizenship to illegal migrants there.