Take heed Nationalists, Citizenship Act fundamental for the security of Nepal: Demographic imbalance likely Bhim Rawal

Reporters Club: Former Deputy Prime Minister (DPM), former Home Minister and Member of Parliament (MP) and also the standing committee member of the ruling Nepal Communist Party Bhim Rawal instructed all the people who loved their country to unite as it was in a situation of complexity, following deepened wrangling between the political parties over the Citizenship Amendment Bill.

Speaking at a special interaction program at the Reporters Club along with its President Rishi Dhamala, the former Deputy Prime Minister stated that our dignity is in danger, “we have created a situation where millions of your youth are going abroad and working in various areas, while we are planning to invite foreigners to acquire citizenship with ease in Nepal. It would be against the demographic fabric of Nepal, one that is in between the two largest nations of the world”. He urged that those patriotic toward their motherland would ponder upon what is happening in this country.

The former DPM and current MP also said that “there was no country in the world that had such ease toward providing citizenship to foreign elements in their nation. Currently if we look at neighboring India under PM Modi, 40 million citizens are uncertain of their citizenship due to the laws there in the state of Assam, India is a large country with a huge land size they can afford to do what they deem fit, but look at what will happen to Nepal, it will be against the demographic fabric of a country that is extremely small in land size and which has just a sizeable population”.

(Former Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Bhim Rawal) 

He encouraged the people to work towards the national interest of the country, we need to strengthen nationalism in true spirit and secure our rights and resources that are meant for the people. He remarked ” look at countries that have borders, US is building a wall, nations have borders, they have strict laws, where are we standing at? Let us not twist or deviate from the core of the issue and face the problem but in line with our national interest”.

The citizenship amendment bill has been a bone of contention with Nepali Congress against any amendment to change the process of naturalization while CPN lawmakers are of the opinion to have any individual wait for a period of 7 years.

Speaking at the same program form DPM Rawal announced that all the required formalities and necessary arrangements for the complete unification of the CPN-UML and CPN-Maoist Centre in Province 7 were completed. He said that the party has lost a lot of time which had put it in a difficult situation, but which will now change with further unification, the delegation of duties and responsibilities accordingly within the party and at the government. “We cannot lose further time and elongate the process rather in the near future we are forming a Central Politburo which will support and strengthen the party.

The former DPM also spoke regarding the stalling of various projects such as the Upper Karnali, while there were administrative hurdles he was of the opinion that the government should intervene and take strong actions against foreign companies like GMR that were non-performing. He also said that it was time for unequal treaties to be ratified and anything that was against the nation annulled.

Giving an example he spoke about when he was part of the team that went to India under the leadership of Late Prime Minister Man Mohan Adhikari, the PM then had asked the Prime Minister of India P.V. Narsimha Rao regarding the inequalities of the 1950 treaty still in place, the Indian PM was positive and had asked to take it up to resolve all issues through diplomatic channels, however it did not materialize as the governments kept changing in Nepal. “When we have a 2/3rds majority we should be able to look into all these aspects which is an opportunity for us”.

The DPM also advised the media to bring out the truth and not resort into taking snippets and creating an illusion among the people regarding sensitive issues.