He highlighted India’s long history of hosting many religious communities (File)
New Delhi:
Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar expressed strong disapproval over the use of sovereign platforms for making ignorant comments on CAA.
Vice President Dhankar emphasized that CAA is intended to provide respite to those who are persecuted on religious grounds in our neighborhood. He emphasized that no one is deprived of citizenship and the story is still so different.
“How can a comment on the Citizenship Amendment Act be made without knowledge of the reality on the ground? We take into account the humanitarian aspect, a reprieve for those who have been persecuted on religious grounds in our neighborhood. No one gets robbed. We don’t invite people to take advantage of it. The benefits of this will accrue to those who have been in this country for more than a decade,” the Vice President said while addressing the American Bar Association (ABA) India Conference 2024.
Referring to the cut-off date for citizenship under the CAA in 2014, the Vice President said we are not inviting people to take advantage of this. “The benefit of this accrues to whom? Who is already in this country? They have been in this country for more than ten years,” he pointed out.
Addressing the second edition of the American Bar Association Spring Conference as chief guest in Delhi, Mr Dhankhar highlighted India’s long history of hosting many religious communities.
The Vice President said those who try to teach us lessons while being ignorant of the ground reality must be rejected.
The Vice President underlined the structured democratic tradition in India, from parliament to panchayat level, and took exception to comments made by some from sovereign platforms on Indian institutions. “We are not a nation that gets scriptures from others,” Mr. Dhankhar said.
“We are a nation with a civilizational ethos dating back more than 5,000 years. Look at the G20 motto: One Earth, One Family, One Future. We didn’t think of it for the G20. It is the nectar of our civilizational value, embedded in our ethos!,” he added.
VP further said, “There are some countries, from different platforms, who want to teach us what is democracy?” and asked the youth to speak out against such things on social media and other platforms.
He called on the young minds to enlighten the countries, in an effort to teach us lessons from their ignorance, and to act diligently.
As he traced India’s economic journey from the fragile five to the big five, the vice president questioned those who had been in power but only spread pessimism. “My heart hurts when someone who was in a position of power in this country in terms of the economy only spread pesimissim,” he added.
R Venkataramani, Attorney General of India, Tushar Mehta, Solicitor General of India, Lalit Bhasin, President of the Society of Indian Law Firms (SILF), Pratibha Jain, Chairman of the India Committee, ABA and other dignitaries were also present at the opportunity.
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