Chandigarh, December 11, 2019: In a memorandum submitted to the President of India through VP Singh Badnore, Governor, Punjab, PPCC has urged him not to approve the Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB) 2019.
The delegation that met the Governor was led by Pradesh Congress president Sunil Jakhar and comprised of Punjab Ministers Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, Sadhu Singh Dharmsot, Balbir Singh Sidhu, Aruna Chaudhary, and MLAs Raj Kumar Verka, Fatehjung Singh Bajwa, Dharamvir Agnihotri, Arun Dogra, Pragat Singh, Kulbir Singh Zira, Gurpreet Singh, Sunil Datti, Raminder Awla, Santokh Bhalaipur.
Speaking to mediapersons on the occasion, Jakhar said that the Central government had totally failed on the economic front and the country was badly hit by recession. To hide its failure, the Modi government wanted to shatter communal harmony by implementing citizenship amendment bill 2019 so that people can be distracted from the real issues of the country.
He said that thousands of martyrs had made India a democratic nation by their supreme sacrifices.
“We are proud of India being the largest democracy in the world. But the Modi government, for its vested political interest, was running rampant schemes to make the country a religion based nation,” he said.
Jakhar said countries like Pakistan, which were established on the basis of religion, were lagging behind on every forum on the international platform but still the NDA government was pursuing its hidden agenda to make India a religion-based nation.
The state Congress president said that the task of dividing the society in the name of religion was left unfulfilled by the British government but now BJP wants to complete British rulers’ agenda.
The central government was poisoning the society by carrying the citizenship amendment bill. Religion-based citizenship was contrary to the basic spirit of secularism in our constitution.
If the minorities in the country survive in a climate of regret and fear, how will the India progress. The country not only runs with majority but to maintain communal harmony was equally important, he added.
Jakhar said that the real game plan of the BJP government was to divert the attention of the people from the actual issues by introducing this bill in such a hurry since the government had completely failed to resolve the issues related to the common people.
Congress party has urged the President of India not to approve the bill to protect the fundamental secular structure of the constitution of the country.
He reiterated that the party will make every possible effort to protect secularism and democracy in India and will never allow the Modi government's tactics to divide the society.