Amid protests against the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act(CAA) and the National Register of Citizens(NRC), Nobel laureate Amartya Sen on Monday, January 13, stressed on the importance of unity among protesters in opposing CAA.
“For any kind of protest, opposition unity is important. Then protests become easier. If there is no unity, protests won’t work. Unity is important if the protest is for a proper cause,” Sen said while talking to the media in Kolkata.
“But even if unity is not there, then that doesn’t mean we will stop protesting. As I said, unity makes protest easier, but if unity is not there still we have to move on and do whatever is necessary,” added Sen, who won the Nobel prize in Economics in 1998.
Sen’s comments have come at a time when six major regional parties decided to skip an opposition party meeting called by Congress president Sonia Gandhi to discuss CAA. The meeting attended by 20 Opposition parties urged Chief Ministers of states opposing NRC to suspend NPR related activities.
The six parties who skipped the meeting were Shiv Sena, Trinamool Congress, Aam Admi Party, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Samajwadi Party, and Bahujan Samaj Party.
Backing Sen’s statements, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor tweeted, “Amartyaji is right. The problem is that the Opposition parties are agreed on national issues, but divided into their various states.”
Last week, Sen had said that the new Citizenship law was not in tune with the Constitution and hence should be scrapped.Also Read:Citizenship Based On Religion May Harm Human Rights: Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen