More than 50 people from around 12 organizations have expressed solidarity with the protests in India against its National Register of Citizens (NRC) - Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
Around 12 organizations, including Sadharon Chhatro Odhikar Sangrakkhan Parishad, Bangladesh Student Union, Ganasamhati Andolan, Bangladesh Student Federation, Rashtrochinta and Muktiforum attended a protest rally along with individual activists, professors, journalists and writers in front of the National Museum, at Shahbagh in Dhaka on Thursday.
United Sapiens Forum, an open platform for all Bangladeshis fighting for rights organized the protest, addressing the atrocious National Registration of Citizens (NRC) and Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) being enacted by the government of India.
The assembly also criticized the attacks on protests organized by Bangladesh Student Rights Preservation Council and demanded the attackers be brought to justice.
The speakers at the assembly stated that Bangladesh’s War for Independence is incongruent with the ideals of CAA-NRC, and that the war did not happen to uphold the doctrine of India’s BJP.
They said NRC and CAA are highly xenophobic and divisive and legalizes some extreme views of Hindu nationalists, and promotes ethnocentrism rather than pluralism. The acts directly oppose the secular ideals of Bangladesh’s independence. Bangladesh and Bangladeshis were targeted in these Hindu nationalist statements and might culminate in a xenophobic outburst against minorities in Bangladesh.
They said The Hindu Nationalist statements were tailored to make minorities in neighbouring countries more vulnerable.
In the past, attacks on the minority population in India have also triggered violence against minorities in Bangladesh, the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992 had led to communal violence in Bangladesh and that the reports of some backlash have already started pouring in with some incidences of push-in from India to Bangladesh, the protesters said.
The assembly presented a five-point list of demands which said: the Government of Bangladesh must protest the NRC and CAA; it should take a strong position against push-in and take action through international law; it should strongly criticize the portrayal of Bangladesh as a fanatical nation in the NRC and CAA laws; it should release a briefing stating that the NRC and CAA will lead to another crisis like the Rohingya situation; and it should vocally express solidarity towards protesting Indian students, and restate their commitment towards multiculturalism in South Asia.
