Hyderabad: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on December 22 launched BJP's election campaign in Delhi ahead of assembly polls in the national capital, and claimed that there were no detention centres in the country.
"No Indian Muslims are being sent to detention centres and neither are there any detention centres in this country," said PM Modi, during the election rally in Delhi's Ramlila Maidan.
But, just how true is this claim made by PM Modi?
To find out the truth behind PM Modi's statement, ETV Bharat travelled to Matia, a small town in Assam's Goalpara district, where the construction of India's largest detention centre is nearing completion.
Located 129 kilometres away from Guwahati city - the capital city of Assam, the detention centre is supposed to accommodate 3,000 "illegal immigrants". It spreads over a stretch of 28, 800 sq feet of land, and the Home Ministry in 2018 had sanctioned an amount of Rs. 46.41 crore in order to construct this centre.
"There will be at least 180 toilets and large dining halls for the detainees. The camp has a total number of 544 rooms and houses basic facilities for healthcare," a construction worker told ETV Bharat.
"The work on this project started in December 2018, our target is to complete it by December 2019. 15 four-storey buildings are being built-13 for men, 2 for women," Rabin Das, a junior engineer working at the detention centre had told media earlier this year.
The state of Assam at the moment has six such centres in operation. They are running from within the jail premises in Dibrugarh, Silchar, Tezpur, Kokrajhar, and Goalpara districts.
Do government figures lie?
Apart from the ground reality, several statements made by government officials and legislators further contradict PM's statement.
In a written response to a question in Rajya Sabha, Union Minister of State (MoS) for Home, Nityanand Rai said, "As informed by the government of Assam, as on 22 November 2019, 988 foreigners were lodged in six detention centres in Assam."
Rai had also said that as many as 28 detainees had died either in the detention centres or in hospitals they were referred to.
Similarly, on July 2, 2019, Union Minister of State (MoS) G Kishan Reddy in Lok Sabha said that six detention centres have been designated in Assam "to hold declared foreigners" and 335 people have been kept in these centres for more than three years.
Apart from Assam, several other states are either coming up with detention centres. Recently, the Karnataka government declared open its first detention centre near Nelamangala, about 40 km away from Bengaluru. The state BJP government had, reportedly, planned to open the centre in January, but advanced it following a directive from the Union government.
Maharashtra Home Ministry, in September 2019, had written to the Navi Mumbai planning authority asking for a three-acre plot in Nerul to build the state's first detention centre.
West Bengal Correctional Services Minister Ujjal Biswas confirmed on November 16, 2019, that the state government has already finalised a piece of land in New Town area for a detention centre and is scouting for another land in Bongaon in North Parganas district for the construction of a second detention centre.
PM Modi's speech in Delhi has also met with criticism by the Opposition who have been accusing him of "lying" to the public.
The Opposition has claimed that the Centre had, on January 9, sent consolidated instructions for the construction of detention centres to all states and Union Territories.
No pan-India NRC?
Apart from courting controversy over his remark on detention centres, PM Modi also contradicted Union Home Minister Amit Shah who has been reiterating the party's stand on generating a nationwide National Register of Citizens (NRC).
During his speech, PM Modi said, "I want to tell the 130 crore people of India that ever since my government came to power in 2014... from then until now... there has been no discussion on NRC anywhere... we only had to implement it in Assam to follow Supreme Court directives."
PM Modi also accused Congress and "Urban Naxals of spreading lies" about NRC.
But Shah, who is often considered the second-in-command in the BJP and the closest ally of PM Modi, has time and again said that they would implement a nationwide NRC to "weed out illegal immigrants".
As recently as December 2019, Home Minister Amit Shah had said, "NRC will be implemented across the country and all infiltrators identified and expelled before 2024 polls," while addressing an election rally in Jharkhand.
A tweet from BJP's official handle also showed Home Minister Amit Shah ensuring "implementation of NRC in the entire country."
On 19 December 2019, the tweet was deleted by BJP as nationwide protests against CAA-NRC picked up.
"The illegal immigrants are like termites. They are eating the grain that should go to the poor, they are taking our jobs. The T of TMC stands for Tushtikaran, (appeasement), M for Mafia and C for Chitfunds," Shah said while addressing a rally in West Bengal in April.
-
Mamata Banerjee’s TMC stands for
— BJP (@BJP4India) April 11, 2019 " class="align-text-top noRightClick twitterSection" data="
T : 'Tushtikaran' of Bangladeshi infiltrators
M : Mafia
C : Chit Funds Scam
It cannot do any good to the people of Bengal: Shri @AmitShah #NaMoForNewIndia pic.twitter.com/34lYisqCZE
">Mamata Banerjee’s TMC stands for
— BJP (@BJP4India) April 11, 2019
T : 'Tushtikaran' of Bangladeshi infiltrators
M : Mafia
C : Chit Funds Scam
It cannot do any good to the people of Bengal: Shri @AmitShah #NaMoForNewIndia pic.twitter.com/34lYisqCZEMamata Banerjee’s TMC stands for
— BJP (@BJP4India) April 11, 2019
T : 'Tushtikaran' of Bangladeshi infiltrators
M : Mafia
C : Chit Funds Scam
It cannot do any good to the people of Bengal: Shri @AmitShah #NaMoForNewIndia pic.twitter.com/34lYisqCZE
The 2019 manifesto of Bharatiya Janata Party also said "in future, we will implement the NRC in a phased manner in other parts of the country" but did not provide details.
The NRC exercise which recently culminated in Assam led to the exclusion of 19, 06, 657 people from the final NRC list, leaving them vulnerable to be declared "foreigners" or "illegal immigrants" if they cannot prove their Indian citizenship.
A total of 3.29 crore people had applied for it, of which 3.11 crore have made it to the final list.
The National Register of Citizen (NRC) is till date the biggest drive to verify citizenship in India. It is aimed at identifying illegal immigrants who entered and settled in Assam, primarily from Bangladesh, after March 25, 1971, and deport them to their native country.
How did CAA come about?
Following the publication of final NRC list in Assam, the ruling BJP had been pushing for an amendment to the Citizenship Act, 1955 through the Citizenship Amendment Bill.
The controversial bill sought to grant citizenship those non-Muslim immigrants from six minority communities- Hindu, Sikh, Parsi, Buddhist, Christian, and Jain - from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh, who have entered India on or before December 31, 2014, on grounds of religious persecution.
The Bill was passed by the Parliament on December 11 and has now become an Act of law- Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) after receiving the President's assent on December 13.
While addressing the rally, PM Modi also claimed that the Citizenship Amendment Act and the NRC do not target Indian Muslims, but millions of people have taken to the streets across India against the CAA, which they feel is a piece of legislation when coupled with nationwide NRC would fast track India's transition into a majoritarian country, as the Act differentiates on the basis of religion while according citizenship.
Meanwhile, to curb the protests in Assam, the ruling BJP has issued a notice to all state government employees, urging them to exercise restraint while handling their respective social media profiles, in view of recent violent protests against CAA.
Similar such notices have been issued for various public-funded educational institutions across the country by the central government.
Also Read: Data for NPR won't be used for NRC, says Amit Shah
