Pakistan slams India's move to enact anti-Muslim citizenship law

The Foreign Office on Thursday lashed out at the Indian government for enacting 2019 controversial citizenship law, saying the discriminatory legislation aimed at “transforming India into a Hindu Rashtra [nation]”.

India on Monday moved to implement the controversial law dubbed as discriminating against Muslims, weeks before PM Modi seeks a rare third term for his Hindu nationalist government.

The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) grants Indian nationality to Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians who fled to Hindu-majority India due to religious "persecution from Muslim-majority Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan before December 31, 2014".

Modi's government did not implement the law following its December 2019 enactment as protests and sectarian violence broke out in New Delhi and elsewhere.

Scores were killed and hundreds injured during days of clashes.

“Yes, we have seen the reports on notification of certain news pursuant to the Indian Citizenship Amendment Act of 2019 and the ugly debate that is currently taking place in India with regards to Muslims, minorities and immigrants," Foreign Office Spokesperson Mumtaz Zehra Baloch said at a weekly press briefing.

The spokesperson said legislation and relevant rules are discriminatory in nature as they differentiate amongst people on the basis of their faith.

These regulations and laws are premised on a false assumption that minorities are being persecuted in Muslim countries of the region and the facade of India being a safe haven for minorities, she said.

“The rising wave of Hindutva under the BJP government has led to rapid political, economic and social victimisation of Muslims and other religious and social minorities, including Dalits.”

The FO spokesperson added: “The discriminatory steps further expose the sinister agenda of transforming India into a Hindu Rashtra.”

The spokesperson also referred to a statement of group of UN Special Rapporteurs urging corrective actions to protect human rights and attacks against minorities in the run-up to India's national elections.

In the same vein, the FO spokesperson said the UN high commissioner for Human Rights has also termed this Act and the regulations as fundamentally discriminatory in nature and in breach of international obligations of India.

“With that, we urge India to take action to protect its own minorities, especially Muslims, who are in a very difficult situation, because of the rising Hindutva in India and the threat that it poses to Indian society and to the region at large,” spokesperson Baloch added.