'Over my dead body': What Mamata Banerjee told PM Modi on CAA-NRC

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on Monday that she has told Prime Minister Narendra Modi that the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) AND National Register of Citizens (NRC) will be implemented in the state "over my dead body."

Addressing a gathering of anti-CAA protesters in Kolkata after attending a government programme where Prime Minister Modi was also present, she said, "Yesterday, I saw CAA notification, I tore it. I have even told Prime Minister that if he wants to do NRC and CAA, he will have to do it over my dead body."

Banerjee met Modi in Kolkata and then headed to a protest against the CAA and the proposed pan-India NRC held by the Trinamool Chhatra Parishad.

Speaking at the demonstration held by TMC's students' wing, Ms Banerjee took a swipe at the Prime Minister. 

"It is Swami Vivekananda's birth anniversary tomorrow. Some people fly down from Delhi to glorify themselves over his name but we work on Swami Ji ideology throughout the year," Mamata said. 

She left the protest to attend the unveiling of Dynamic Architectural Illumination of Rabindra Setu (Howrah Bridge) by PM Modi and then came back to the protest site. 

As she arrived back at the protest site, she was greeted by angry students of Jadavpur University who laid siege to the protest site. 

Addresses protesting Jadavpur University students and TMC students' wing activists, she said, "I was invited to several programmes but I went only for one event at the Millennium Park, due to Constitutional obligation. I met PM and said to him that we are against CAA and NPR."

Earlier, Banerjee met Modi and demanded roll back of the CAA and scrapping of proposed NRC. The meeting was held at the Raj Bhavan. 

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, she said, "While speaking to Prime Minister, I told him that we are against CAA, NPR and NRC. We want that CAA and NRC should be withdrawn."

The National Population Register (NPR) is a register of usual residents linked with location particulars such as village/town, sub-district, district and state, the government said. 

The Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress has been opposed to CAA and NRC from the beginning, even making this into a citizenship issue. Since student protests have become the face of anti-CAA-NRC protests elsewhere in the country, the TMC, too, is looking to mobilise popular support through the party's student wing. 

The new law promises citizenship to members of 6 non-Muslim communities from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh who entered India before December 31, 2014.

Massive protests have erupted across the country against the new law. Some of the protests, most of them in Uttar Pradesh where 19 people have been killed, turned violent, following which the police launched a massive crackdown arresting hundreds of protesters across the state.

Critics say that the new law is against the secular nature of the Indian Constitution and clubbed with the NRC may be misused to strip away some Muslims' citizenship in the country. The BJP, however, has argued that the law has nothing to do with India's Muslims and only helps those who fled religious persecution in the neighbouring countries.