US ‘concerned’ about CAA implementation in India, says ‘closely monitoring’

The United States on Thursday said it is concerned about the notification of the Citizenship Amendment Act’s (CAA) rules in India. State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said that the US is closely monitoring the act’s implementation.

“We are concerned about the notification of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act on March 11,” Miller said in a response to a question at a daily briefing.

“We are closely monitoring how this act will be implemented. Respect for religious freedom and equal treatment under the law for all communities are fundamental democratic principles,” he added.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-led Central government on Monday implemented CAA, the law that paves the way for citizenship to undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who entered India before December 31, 2014. The development came four years after Parliament passed the law in December 2019.

The notification of the Act triggered criticism from Opposition leaders, who claimed that the notified rules were “unconstitutional”, “discriminatory” and violative of the “secular principle of citizenship” enshrined in the Constitution.

Critics of the CAA also argued that by excluding Muslims from its purview and linking citizenship to religious identity, the law undermines the secular principles enshrined in the Indian Constitution.

The Centre, however, has maintained that the CAA is about granting citizenship and that no citizen of the country will lose citizenship.

In an interview with news agency ANI on Thursday, Union Home Minister Amit Shah asserted that CAA will never be taken back and the BJP-led government will never compromise with it.

“This is our sovereign right to ensure Indian citizenship in our country, we will never compromise on it and CAA will never be taken back,” the senior BJP leader said in an interview with ANI.

Shah added: “The opposition has no other work. They have a history of saying one thing and doing another. However, the history of Prime Minister Modi and the BJP is different. What BJP or PM Modi says is like carved in stone. Every guarantee made by Modi is fulfilled.”