Amid opposition by most parties, Tripura govt to implement CAA

The BJP government in Tripura is preparing to implement the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), Chief Minister Manik Saha announced here on Friday amid opposition from other political parties which fear the new law will trigger communal tensions in the state.

Speaking to the media on the sidelines of a blood donation camp at a mosque here, Saha said that after directions from the Centre, the state government is preparing to implement CAA in Tripura.

To recall, on March 11, the Centre notified the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules 2024, thus paving the way for enforcing the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which seeks to grant Indian citizenship to persecuted Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians who came to India from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan before December 31, 2014.

Following the advice of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), a six-member state-level empowered committee with the Director of Census Operations as its chairman was formed in Tripura recently to grant citizenship under the CAA.

“After the advice of the MHA, like other states and Union Territories in the country, a state-level empowered committee was constituted for granting Indian citizenship under the CAA. District-level committees headed by the District Magistrates of all the eight districts were also formed accordingly," Rabindra Reang, Director of Census Operations, Tripura, told IANS.

He said the district-level empowered committees would receive applications under the CAA and scrutinise them before forwarding the same to the empowered panel.

The official said those who want Indian citizenship under the CAA will have to apply to the district-level committee for consideration.

Under the Act, those living in areas under the Tribal Autonomous Council, which was constituted under the Sixth schedule of the Constitution, are not eligible to apply for citizenship, the official said.

Tripura has a lone tribal autonomous body -- Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council -- which has jurisdiction over two-thirds of Tripura's 10,491 sq km area, and is home to over 12,16,000 people, of which around 84 per cent are tribals.

Along with the opposition CPI-M and Congress, the Tipra Motha Party (TMP), a new ally of the BJP in the state, has also been opposing the CAA since the very beginning.

TMP founder Pradyot Bikram Manikya Debbarma on Friday doubted the implementation of CAA in its present form, saying anyone who has illegally entered the state may claim citizenship with false documents, and verifying the authenticity of such documents is also very tough.

Implementation of CAA in its present form is not acceptable, he told the media.

“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 of the northeastern states, because the number of indigenous people in the region is small and if we do not have a proper system, many people can come and claim that they have been here for years.”

Strongly opposing the BJP government’s decision, opposition leader and CPI-M state Secretary Jitendra Choudhury reiterated his party's longstanding opposition to the CAA, saying he has filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court against the Act.

He also expressed concern that the implementation of CAA will negatively impact the entire northeastern region, which has suffered due to significant influxes in the past.

Choudhury claimed that to get political mileage during the Lok Sabha elections and to divert attention from the electoral bond issue, the CAA is being implemented now.

Congress MLA and former minister Sudip Roy Barman echoed these concerns.

Expressing sympathy with the persecuted minorities in the neighboring countries, Roy Barman said he fears that implementing CAA could reignite tribal insurgency in Tripura by further marginalising the tribal community.

He also claimed that granting citizenship to foreigners based on religion would strain India's financial resources and encourage fundamentalist forces across the border, making the CAA an ineffective solution.