The Joint Forum Against NRC, a conglomerate of organisations protesting against the citizenship tripod, on Friday said Union home minister Amit Shah was bluffing when he told the Matua community that the Citizenship Amendment Act would be implemented after the completion of the Covid-19 vaccination drive.

“There is a disconnect between the demand from the Matuas and the provisions contained in the law that the Parliament passed. The Matuas want unconditional citizenship while the law doesn’t include such a provision. Union home minister is bluffing the Matuas by saying that citizenship would be offered after the completion of the vaccination,” said Prasenjit Bose, convenor of the forum.

According to him, the law makes it clear that “certificate of naturalisation” or “certificate of registration” — which are likely to resolve the citizenship issue of the immigrant community from Bangladesh — would be issued only after one files an application and meets certain conditions.

“If these are the provisions in the law, how can the rules, which are not yet framed, offer unconditional citizenship?)” asked Bose, while adding that this disconnect was the reason behind the Centre delaying the framing of rules of the CAA.

To buttress his argument, Bose rolled out the example of the two farm bills that the Centre passed on September 20, 2020.

“The rules were notified on October 20 and 21 respectively... If the government can frame the rules for farm laws in a month, why does it take them more than 14 months to frame the rules of CAA?” he asked.

Bose and his colleagues in the forum have decided to organise a Citizenship Secure Yatra between February 26 and March 5 through the Matua-dominated areas in Nadia and North 24-Parganas to spread awareness of the “inconsistencies” in the claims of the Centre.

“Ordinary gullible people are fooled in the name of citizenship... We will try to convince them that they are being taken for granted by the BJP,” he said.

According to him, the Atal Behari Vajpayee government created the biggest problem for refugees in 2003 by amending the original citizenship act of 1955 as the concept of “doubtful citizen” got woven into the act. “The amendment changed the status of refugees as they became infiltrators... It’s an irony that the party that brought this change is dangling the citizenship carrot today,” he said, demanding the repeal of the 2003 amended act and the CAA.