Congress spells out stance about NRC.
The Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting on Saturday repositioned party’s stand on the issue of National Register of Citizens (NRC). Unlike the previous few days when senior leaders of Congress in Parliament were ambivalent about the process of deportation and enumeration, Congress took a dramatically different stand after the CWC. Congress party said that they did a better job in deporting illegal Bangladeshi’s from India than BJP. “We deported 82,728 illegal immigrants between 2005-2013 whereas BJP only deported 1822 in the last 4 years,” said Randeep Surjewala, Chairman of the Congress Media Cell.
Congress Party said that NRC is a product of the Assam Accord which was forged by former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1985. Congress also said that 25,000 enumerators were employed under the Congress regime and 80% of the process was completed when Tarun Gogoi’s government was in power. Congress said that former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh provided Rs 440 crores to employ enumerators. Congress also said that, BJP is trying to politicise the issue for electoral reasons. Surjewala also added that Congress would help people who find themselves out of the list. “ Every person should get a chance to prove his citizenship,” said Randeep Surjewala.
CWC also focused on three other issues. Sources in the CWC said that Congress has decided to push Rafale as major electoral issue for 2019 Lok Sabha elections. For this reason, CWC had detailed discussion on Rafale, bank scams, farmers' distress and economy and blamed downturn on the decisions taken by the Narendra Modi’s government. Congress leaders made it amply clear that with these issues on table, it is going into the election mode. Congress said that very soon they would launch campaigns around these issues and Rafale would lie at the heart of it. The party wants to project Rafale as a case of corruption and crony capitalism.
Congress President Rahul Gandhi made it clear that party’s apex body CWC would be meeting more frequently to discuss issues of national importance. The CWC held on Saturday was second in last 10 days. This is a big departure from Sonia Gandhi’s years when CWC met infrequently and was not used as a regular platform for policy discussions. The CWC held on Saturday was not attended by the UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
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