After having faced considerable flak over its counter response to anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) appears to have woken up and deployed some of its top leaders and Union Minister’s as part of its ‘CAA related Outreach of Leaders’. Former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan will lead a march in support of CAA in Nashik on December 30. While, Sunil Deodhar, BJP national secretary will lead a similar march in Nizamabad in Telangana on the same day.
After the electoral defeat in the just concluded Jharkhand assembly elections, the BJP began facing criticism over its inability to effectively counter the anti-CAA narrative. Speaking to The News 21 on conditions of anonymity, a senior BJP national leader from Maharashtra, disclosed that the party leadership has drawn up plans asking its senior party leaders, ministers, MP’s and legislators to go out and reach out to the people, especially the minorities and explain to them the details and dispel their doubts about the CAA.
Between December 29, 2019 and January 2, 2020, the party has deployed eight of its senior party leaders, three of whom are Union Ministers. On December 29, Arun Singh will be in North 24 Pargana district of West Bengal, national spokesperson GVL Narasimha Rao will be at Rajamundry in Andhra Pradesh. On December 30, Nityanand Rai will be in Cooch Behar, Union Minister for Jal Shakti, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat will be in Karim Nagar, Telangana.
While, Union Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways, General V K Singh will lead the march in Bikaner, Rajasthan. Union Minister of State for Youth Affairs and Sports, Kiren Rijiju will hold a rally in support of the CAA at Mysore, Karnataka.
On Friday, Fadnavis held a rally in support of the CAA at August Kranti Maidan in which he lashed out at the Shiv Sena, Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) retorting that the government seems to have lost its mind and senses by denying the BJP to hold a march. On Saturday, though All India Congress Committee’s general secretary and Maharashtra in-charge, Mallikarjun Kharge called Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah as master liars for misguiding the public on the issue of the Citizenship Amendment Act and the National Register of Citizens.
