Staff Reporter
ITANAGAR, Dec 28: Describing Prime Minister Narendra Modi as “an enemy of the country,” the Arunachal Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) asked Modi and union Home Minister Amit Shah to “leave Delhi and go back to Gujarat.”
Hundreds of Congress party functionaries, including members of its frontal wings and youth wing, from across the state staged a protest march here on Saturday against the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), using the slogan, ‘Save India, Save Constitution’.
The peaceful march started from Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan and culminated in the Raj Bhavan area here. The protestors shouted slogans, describing Modi as an enemy of the country.
“Narendra Modi, desh ka dushman (Narendra Modi, the enemy of the nation)!”, “Narendra Modi, Gujarat jao, Delhi chodo, Delhi chodo (Narendra Modi, leave Delhi, go back to Gujarat)!”, and “Amit Shah, Gujarat jao, Delhi chodo, Delhi chodo (Amit Shah, leave Delhi, go back to Gujarat)!” shouted the marchers.
The rally was a continuation of the Congress party’s fight against the CAA. The party organised a nationwide protest, demanding that the CAA be revoked.
Stepping up the attack on the Modi-led BJP government for passing the discriminatory law in the parliament, former APCC president Takam Sanjoy said: “We have seen the political changes in Indian history, saw Indira Gandhi’s government, Janata Party’s government, but never ever seen such government like Modi-Shah
now running the country,” Sanjoy said, accusing the two of “destroying the very core of the Indian constitution.”
Sanjoy said the preamble to the constitution “is the heart and soul of every citizen living in India, and the constitution has given safeguards even to the Indians living abroad.”
“Modi doesn’t listen to anyone – even to the media. Whoever questions him, he threatens them, arm-wrestles them through the CBI and the enforcement department,” Sanjoy added.
Arunachal Pradesh Youth Congress president Geli Ete also slammed the BJP government for passing the citizenship amendment bill, and demanded that the “divisive and xenophobic CAA” be repealed.
“The CAA is divisive and xenophobic in nature; our demand is to revoke and withdraw the CAA,” said Ete.
He said that “Arunachal is not safe, though it is exempted under the BEFR.”
“The BJP is fooling the people by giving exemption to Arunachal from the CAA under the BEFR. In the true sense, the BEFR cannot protect the state from influx,” he said.
“Instead of giving citizenship to foreigners, the government should give jobs to and bring development for its own people,” Ete said.
APCC vice-president Nani Rajen read out the preamble to the Indian constitution, near the Raj Bhavan, during the rally.
The APCC later submitted a memorandum to the governor, urging his office to endorse the APCC’s resolution against the CAA, which is termed an “arbitrary, unconstitutional, communal and draconian law.”
