the goan I network
PANAJI
Barely days after a huge public meeting spearheaded by the Church body, Council for Social Justice and Peace (CSJP) in Margao rejected the Citizens Amendment Act (CAA), the National Population Register (NPR) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC), further pressure is being built with a rally and another anti-CAA public meeting planned in Margao, on January 30.
The CSJP along with the Concerned Citizens for Goa (CCFD) and National Confederation of Human Rights Organizations (Goa Unit) has organised the rally from the Fatorda stadium at 3 pm to the ground opposite the SGPDA, adjacent to St Francis Xavier’s Chapel.
The rally will reach the St Francis Xavier’s Chapel at 4.30 pm, which will be followed by a public meeting on “Save democracy - Save Constitution” from 4.30 pm to 6 pm.
According to a joint press release issued by CSJP Executive Secretary Fr Savio Fernandes, CCFD Chair Samir Sheikh and NCHRO-Goa Working President Ranjan Solomon, the rally and meet have been planned on Martyrs’ Day or Shaheed Diwas, celebrated by the nation on January 30, “to reassert our struggle against attempts to snatch away the individual and collective freedoms because of the CAA, NRC and the NPR.”
“Our rally and public meeting will listen to eminent voices drawn from civil society who will enumerate the aspirations of our people and inspire constructive and corrective action.”
“On this day, we especially commemorate the martyrdom of Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the nation and the tallest hero of India’s independence, who died at the hands of an assassin’s bullet. Gandhi united many streams of India’s people in India’s freedom movement with non-violence.”
The CSJP, CCFD and NCHRO-Goa claimed that India’s freedom is being snatched away, “this time by our own leaders under the pretext of securing our national security.”
“We, therefore, come together to express our conviction and commitment towards a renewed unity in India to attain a sovereign socialist secular democratic republic and to secure to all its citizens justice, social, economic and political.”
“In this regard, we reject the crude attempts of the current BJP dispensation to impose dictatorial and divisive measures which will snatch away our basic rights and eat into our secular fabric. We pledge to work in the same spirit of our martyrs and firmly, unceasingly, and peacefully resist all attempts to alter our Constitutional rights,” stated the joint press release.
The involvement of the Church in Goa is been seen as a major turning point in the anti-CAA agitation in the State, which has left many political leaders uneasy especially in constituencies with a sizeable Catholic community.
At a huge anti-CAA public meeting convened by the CSJP at the Lohia Maidan in Margao on January 24, thousands of people rejected in one voice the CAA/NRC/NPR and demanded that the Goa state Assembly approved a resolution demanding that the Centre immediately and unconditionally revoke the CAA and all activities related to the NPR and the NRC.
