In retrospect, India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) leaders, currently in retreat over the new citizenship Act (CAA) and the NRC exercise, must admit publicly that their otherwise unexceptionable campaign to prepare a reliable, accurate list of citizens has been comprehensively bungled. The outcome of their efforts has been disastrous not only on the political plane -- even dedicated officials will now find it difficult to act fairly on claims for citizenship from any part of India. As of now, they along with the ruling party leaders, will remain too busy controlling political protests, costing 30 plus lives already, for some time.
Politically, the otherwise mangled and marginalized opposition parties have staged a comeback of sorts. There are two major indications of the pressures the BJP has been facing on the citizenship issue.
First, on behalf of the Union Home Ministry and other agencies, there have been too many conflicting signals in recent tweets or statements -- some conciliatory, some unyielding -- but the net result has been the same: confusion! The message that the central Government itself is unsure and divided has gone home unerringly to the opposition as well as common people.
Second, India’s redoubtable Home Minister Amit Shah’s apparent rigidity on his one point slogan that the NRC (National Register for Citizens) updating exercise would take place all over the country has totally backfired.
Shah often peppered his speeches with graphic visions of 'ghuspetias' (illegal infiltrators) being identified and packed off physically into neighbouring Bangladesh (incidentally, it is the one country that is most friendly to India in South Asia) or to be interned indefinitely in detention centres.
As the dust begins to settle, it is clear that Shah got too much carried away by his own hyperbolic rhetoric. Apparently the over confident Minister spoke without reference either to official preparedness in the handling of the NRC, or the government’s ability to carry out its declared objective. Yet there can be no denying that the periodic upgrading of its citizens’ list is the primary duty of any Government anywhere. A totally unnecessary hardline official approach has made the implementation of a logical, much needed policy controversial and self-defeating.
Now there is much official backtracking stressing that the NRC was still in the ‘discussion’ stage, ideas and suggestions were welcome, that Muslim citizens need not worry etc. Mr Shah remains noticeably silent. The centre has retreated several steps backwards, to ensure that the fires of protest are put out immediately, the opposition consolidation is not allowed to go further. And to reduce the damage that has been already done. It has been a setback for the Hindutva hareliners.
The anti-CAA and the anti-NRC protests brought almost the entire Muslim community together as never before in recent years. Many Hindus are supporting them as well. This was certainly the last the thing the BJP wanted to happen. One observer said in Kolkata, ‘The Muslims were out in strength everywhere not only because of the CAA or the NRC. Many of them were angry, frustrated and demoralised over certain recent developments. The abrogation of Ar 370 and 35a for the Kashmir valley, the anti-Tripple Talaq bill, the judgment on Babri Masjid demolition, had left even major Muslim leaders quiet and clueless. There was hardly any support from Pakistan, from the US, China or the EU about Muslims in India. They saw themselves as friendless and alone. The question of citizenship, they felt it as the proverbial last straw. Even their claims of being Indian was under threat, they would end up being stateless, some herded in jails, others reduced as human being---- No winder there was an explosion of violence in some pockets,’ he said.
Ironically, the BJP hardliners had set out to achieve a Hindu consolidation. They ended up achieving a Muslim consolidation instead.
It is not difficult to see where the BJP went off the rails. Thanks again to its uncontrollable hardliners, it lost control of events mainly owing to the fiasco of the Assam NRC updating exercise.
The cutoff date of Mar 24, 1971 in Assam for Indian citizens was always going to pose a problem for people, who faced the tortures of the damned to prove that they/their ancestors had lived in Assam/India before then. A large, informally- run colony like undivided India, ruled by British imperialists, could never be a record keeper’s paradise, with a literacy rate in 1947 of 11%!
How could anyone in high authority, with a modicum of common sense could expect people to come up with convincing proof of birth, education, residence, land or service records, stretching back to well over 50 years? This is what the NRC enumerators, ordered by the Supreme Court, were asking of the people.
And India’s Apex court, under Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, proceeded to do to enforce its rules rigidly. From an initial set of 14 documents, the Assam authorities made things more and more difficult by asking for additional proof and collaboration. The misspelling of a name in an old document by a single letter often led to an instant rejection of application from people, regardless of their social standing or economic stature, alleged observers. Failure to produce the birth certificate or other details of one’s parents/grandparents was ground enough for the summary rejection of applications.
Worse, complaints against excesses made by numerous victims, ranging from University vice Chancellors, ex soldiers, MPs, Ministers and MLAs to the poorest barely literate people--- made no difference to authorities! The Apex court, on one or two occasions while dealing with specific complaints of harassment, said that let things continue for the time being, while the authorities would record all statements! This prolonged the ordeal of people, especially the poor who could not afford legal assistance.
Until men like social activist Harsh Mander and some other HR activists exposed the inhuman conditions in which over 1,000 men, women and children were herded without even basic amenities like newspapers and electricity in 6 Assamese detention centres, the world outside did not know how many people had been condemned for life for their failure to secure documents. Almost without exception, they were Bengali Hindus and Muslims.
Nearly 20 people, mostly above 60 in age, died of physical and mental anguish, depression and exhaustion. Their relatives often refused to accept their bodies for cremation. The relatives were not arrested and as free citizens, protested strongly against the incarceration of their parents etc, just because some officials rejected their applications.
As details were published in the national and international press about the excesses of the NRC exercise, (later to be rejected even by the ruling BJP itself!) the Assam authorities began harassing even journalists who reported on the issue!
Veteran journalist Subir Bhaumik is one such sufferer who faced legal harassment from the authorities. "Instead of treating people with more respect and sympathy, the unhelpful attitude among officials gave the entire NRC proceedings’ a very bad name," he says. A slightly more humane approach, he adds, would have helped the NRC exercise. As it happened, it turned out to be a thoroughly controversial, discredited, inaccurate and wasteful operation that the Supreme Court could not save from becoming an administrative disaster.
Not only India ended up getting a bad name internationally over the Assam NRC, it has now become doubtful if ever the Centre would be able to prepare proper citizen’s list. This marks as a major setback for the BJP thanks to its Hindu hardliners especially those in Assam.