Clashes continue between Indian police and protesters angered by a new citizenship law that excludes Muslims. Prime Minister Narendra Modi defended the legislation at a rally, accusing the opposition of pushing the country into a “fear psychosis.'
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi addresses a rally of his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party in New Delhi, India, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2019. Clashes continued Sunday between Indian police and protesters angered by a new citizenship law that excludes Muslims, as Modi used the rally to defend the legislation, accusing the opposition of pushing the country into a "fear psychosis."
Most of the deaths have occurred in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, where 20% of the state’s 200 million people are Muslim. Police, who deny any wrongdoing, said that among the 15 people killed in the state was an 8-year-old boy who died in a stampede in the city of Varanasi, the heart of Modi’s parliamentary constituency. Since last week, police in Uttar Pradesh have taken nearly 900 people into custody for engaging in violence.
“People who are trying to spread lies and fear, look at my work. If you see any trace of divisiveness in my work, show it to the world,” he said. The new law allows Hindus, Christians and other religious minorities who are in India illegally to become citizens if they can show they were persecuted because of their religion in Muslim-majority Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan. It does not apply to Muslims.
The demonstrations also follow a contentious process in the northeastern state of Assam meant to weed out foreigners living in the country illegally. Nearly 2 million people, about half Hindu and half Muslim, were excluded from an official list of citizens — called the National Register of Citizens, or NRC — and have been asked to prove their citizenship or else be considered foreign.
On Sunday, Modi denied the existence of a detention center, accusing the Congress party of spreading fear that Indian Muslims would be jailed there. He also said that his opponents resented him for his work strengthening India’s ties to Iran, Saudi Arabia and other Islamic countries.
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