Leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lashed out at the Telangana government for adopting a resolution in the state assembly against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the National Population Register (NPR) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC).
BJP state unit president Bandi Sanjay Kumar said that if Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and Asaduddin Owaisi of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) do not want to register for the NPR due to political reasons, they can "seek refuge in Pakistan".
Bandi Sanjay, who was leading a BJP delegation that protested in New Delhi against the Telangana government, also claimed that the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) had earlier carried out an exercise similar to the NPR.
The Telangana Assembly on Monday adopted a resolution against the CAA, the NPR and the NRC and urged the Centre to amend the CAA "in order to remove all references to any religion, or to any foreign country", given apprehensions among a large section of people in India.
The resolution also alleged that there have been "concerted attempts" to tinker with the inclusive and non-religious nature of Indian citizenship through the CAA, NPR and NRC.
BJP leader Bala Subrahmanyam Kamarsu, who is also its Parliamentary Party Secretary, said that KCR had exhibited his "ignorance" of the Constitution by pushing the resolution since the citizenship issue is the sole prerogative of the Centre.
The resolution, he said, is part of KCR's "blatant attempt to settle Rohingya Muslims" in Hyderabad in collusion with the AIMIM for the two parties' vote bank politics.
"KCR claims to have read over 70,000 books. But he has exhibited his ignorance of India's Constitution and his foolishness. It is the bounden duty of a state government to implement the law passed by Parliament. Such a resolution is meaningless," Kamarsu told reporters.
Taking a swipe at KCR over his claim that the latter did not have his birth certificate and nor did his father, the BJP leader wondered as to how he completed his education and became a lawmaker without furnishing details of his date of birth.
Telangana Governor not informed?
Meanwhile, it was also reported that the TRS government did not send any official communication to Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan on the resolution adopted by the Assembly on Monday.
Sources close to her said that there was also no prior official intimation to her about the plan to move such a resolution. The government, however, had agreed to delete some anti-CAA wordings in her recent address to the Assembly when she had objected to them, they said.
The Governor had clearly told the state government that such laws enacted by Parliament cannot be criticised or opposed in the state Assembly. Fifty-eight-year-old Tamilisai Soundararajan, who took charge as the Governor on September 9, 2019, was the Tamil Nadu BJP unit president till her present appointment.
KCR while speaking in the Assembly on the resolution had said, "For the first time in India, the CAA introduced a religious test to acquire Indian citizenship while also providing for an accelerated path for non-Muslims of Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan."
With Monday's development, Telangana has joined non-BJP ruled states like West Bengal, Kerala, Rajasthan, Punjab, Delhi, Puducherry and Bihar which have also passed resolutions on the same issue.