New Delhi: Bold, scathing comments on the Muslim community has now become a norm for BJP party leaders with these politicians in position abusing their power and status to harass Indian Muslims.
While Delhi voters came out to cast their votes on Saturday amidst the polarized election campaign and massive protests against the unconstitutional CAA, proposed NRC, BJP’s Karanataka Unit triggered controversy with its communal undertones and in return received heavy backlash from the citizens who have come together to fight this dictatorship.
The BJP Karnataka unit shared a video of Muslim women voters in burqas standing in a polling booth queue to cast their vote in Delhi.
The video was captioned sarcastically read,””Kaagaz Nahi Dikayenge Hum”!!! Keep the documents safe, you will need to show them again during #NPR exercise. #DelhiPolls2020″.
The caption was in reference to the ‘Kagaz Nahin Dikhaenge‘ slogan popularly raised by protesters, artists and activists opposing the recently passed Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 as well as the proposed implementation of nation-wide National Register of Citizens.
While BJP is on its ground not to take its step back against the imposed CAA in India that is discriminatory against not only Muslims but other minor communities, an additional NRC exercise meant to identify illegal immigrants in India is also under process.
The National Population Register exercise is to be conducted from April to identify all “usual residents”, but critics have called it the first step towards a pan-India NRC after questions related to place of birth of parents were added to the form.
The slogan ‘Kagaz Nahin Dikhaenge’ literally translates to “We will not show our papers” which means the protesters opposing CAA, NRC and NPR will not show relevant documents in order to prove they are citizens of India as a mark of civil disobedience.
Meanwhile, the BJP government has denied from claims of imposing this exercise in India, at least for now, in Parliament’s recent session.
The ruling government seems to convince that the collected information in NPR will not be used for NRC and that information shared for NPR will be voluntary.
But despite all these false claims, BJP Karnataka, however, seems to be acknowledging the possibility of an NRC taking place by asking the Muslim voters to keep their identity documents safe for when they need it for NRC.
The video was instantly picked up by communal trolls. One Twitter user wrote, “Who are these Muslims with no conscience? Till yesterday, they were saying ‘we will not show papers’. Today, they stand in line with their identity papers in hand.”
By sharing a video of just Muslim women holding up their voter ID cards, the tweet also appears to create polarisation among Muslims, many of whom have been protesting in the national capital for days against CAA, NRC and NPR.
BJP Karnataka unit’s tweet confused many on Twitter who wondered why the BJP was taking such a disparate stance on the issue.
Meanwhile many individuals have slammed the tone-deaf and ‘threatening’ tweet against Muslim women.