Husain Mohamed – Radio Islam News – 24.12.2019

A group of South African students, academics and activists, in conjunction with organisations including Protect the Rohingya, the Wits Muslim Students Association, the Wits Palestine Solidarity Committee, Johannesburg Against Injustice, Conscience Collective, the Media Review Network, the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation and SA Friends of Kashmir organised a protest on Monday the 23rd of December, outside the Indian Consulate General in Parktown.

Quite a number of people attended the protest and made their voices heard. The protest started at 7am and went on until 12pm.

The coalition was organised under the banner ‘South Africans against Apartheid India’ and the demonstration is in response to the adoption of the discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC) by the Indian state.

Speaking to Radio Islam, One of the organizers for the protest, Sister Faatima Laher said they felt that it was only right to stand in solidarity with students in India.

“We saw what happened with student movements in India and as the generation of ‘Fees Must Fall’, we felt that it was only right that we stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in India.”

The CAA is discriminatory because it grants citizenship to immigrants and refugees of the Hindu, Sikh, Christian, Parsi, Buddhist and Jain faiths, but does not extend this right to Muslims and other religious minorities.

The NRC requires every person in India to prove, through historical documentation reflecting ancestral links to India that they have a right to live in the country.

For Muslims and other religious minorities who are considered “illegal immigrants”, this requires historical documents that, by definition, undocumented migrants do not possess. For Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Parsis, Buddhists and Jains, also previously considered “illegal immigrants”, no such documentation is required to obtain citizenship.