AGARTALA: The BJP government in Tripura is set to implement the citizenship amendment act (CAA), chief minister Manik Saha announced on Friday (May 17).
This decision comes amid strong opposition from other political parties, who fear the new law could ignite communal tensions in Tripura.
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Speaking to the media at a blood donation camp at a mosque, Saha stated that following directives from the Centre, the Tripura government is gearing up to enforce the CAA in the state.
On March 11, the Centre notified the citizenship amendment rules 2024, facilitating the implementation of the CAA, which aims to grant Indian citizenship to persecuted Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis, and Christians who arrived in India from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan before December 31, 2014.
Acting on the directions of the ministry of home affairs (MHA), Tripura government recently formed a six-member state-level empowered committee, chaired by the Director of Census Operations, to grant citizenship under the CAA.
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Tripura’s lone tribal autonomous body, the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC), oversees two-thirds of the state’s 10,491 sq km area, home to over 12,16,000 people, approximately 84% of whom are tribals.
Alongside the opposition CPI-M and Congress, the Tipra Motha Party (TMP), a new BJP ally in Tripura, has also opposed the CAA from the outset.
TMP founder Pradyot Bikram Manikya Debbarma expressed scepticism about CAA’s implementation in its current form, warning that it could enable illegal entrants to claim citizenship with false documents, making verification challenging.
“We may be a partner of the BJP, but our party’s principles and policies are very clear. We do not want demographic changes in any Northeast state because the indigenous population is small. Without a proper system, many people can falsely claim long-term residency,” Debbarma told the media.
Opposition leader and CPI-M state secretary Jitendra Choudhury reiterated his party’s longstanding opposition to the CAA, revealing that he has filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court against the Act.
Choudhury warned that implementing the CAA would adversely affect the entire Northeast region, which has historically suffered from significant influxes.
He suggested the CAA is being implemented now for political mileage in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and to divert attention from the electoral bond issue.
Tripura Congress MLA and former minister Sudip Roy Barman shared these concerns.
While expressing sympathy for persecuted minorities in neighbouring countries, Roy Barman warned that the CAA’s implementation could reignite tribal insurgency in Tripura by further marginalizing the tribal community.
He also argued that granting citizenship based on religion could strain India’s financial resources and bolster fundamentalist forces across the border, making the CAA an ineffective solution.