Biplab Deb's name will be excluded if NRC is implemented in Tripura, says Mamata Banerjee

Kolkata, December 12, 2019:

Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee on Friday slammed the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill and the National Register of Citizens (NRC), by terming them as "two sides of the same coin." She further took potshots at her Tripura counterpart Biplab Deb, hinting that he might be from Bangladesh.

Slamming the proposition of a nationwide NRC process, she said that if the NRC is implemented, the Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb's name would also be excluded. "Ask him (Deb), when did he come here?" she said.

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Equating the struggle against the CAB and the NRC to India's struggle for independence, Mamata assured that her Government is prepared for the 'second independence movement', and Bengal will lead it.

Banerjee further stated that her administration will never allow the implementation of the NRC in Bengal. Issuing a warning to the Union Government, she said that if they discriminate on the basis of religion, her regime will oppose the NRC.

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According to the newly-drafted version of the CAB, which was distributed among MPs on Friday, the new law will not be applicable in the Inner Line Permit (ILP) regime areas and those tribal regions governed under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution.

The ILP regime is applicable in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram. The areas where the new law will not apply also include include Assam, Meghalaya and Tripura.

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