With no sign of protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) abating, former Union Minister Yashwant Sinha on Thursday launched a 3,000 km 'Gandhi Shanti Yatra' from Mumbai to New Delhi to seek the repeal of CAA and concrete assurance from the Government that there would not be a nationwide National Citizens Register (NRC).
NCP chief Sharad Pawar flagged off the 'Gandhi Shanti Yatra' at the historic Gateway of India in south Mumbai, a yatra that will pass through five States —Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana — before culminating at Raj Ghat in New Delhi on January 30, the death anniversary of the Mahatma Gandhi.
Apart from the repeal of CAA and non-implementation of NRC across India, Sinha is demanding a judicial inquiry by a sitting Judge of the Supreme Court into the acts of “state-sponsored violence” like the one witnessed at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) recently.
Senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, Dalit leader Prakash Ambedkar, senior actor-turned-politician Shatrugan Sinha, State Minority Affairs Minister Nawab Malik and former MP Balachandra Mungekar were prominent among those present at the yatra flagging-off ceremony.
Speaking on the occasion, Sinha said: The country is witnessing the disturbance and therefore, we are taking out a yatra [march] in order to establish peace and harmony in the country. We will not let the country be divided. We will go by constitution. We will not let anyone kill Gandhi”.
Pawar hit out at the Narendra Modi for creating an atmosphere of fear in the minds of people across the country over CAA and NRC. “There is acute fear in the minds of people with no birth and other documents with them that they may be sent to detention camps.
The people across the country are unhappy with the Government at the Centre. That’s why people are taking to streets in protest against the Modi Government. There is need to show right direction to the people. We can save the Constitution through non-violent means,” the NCP Chief Minister.
Pawar expressed confidence that a large people would turn out in Sinha’s 21-day “Gandhi Shanti Yatra”.
The rally is being organised under the banner of Rashtra Manch, a political platform launched by Yashwant Sinha last month. The yatra is supported by farmers' organisation Shetakari Jagar Manch. “Various organisations including farmers will participate in the yatra,” Sinha said.
Sinha tweeted that the route for Gandhi Shanti Yatra-2020 and all other updates would be made notified on a specially created Facebook page for the yatra.
Sinha, who resigned from the Indian Adminstrative Service (IAS) and joined active politics as a member of Janata party in 1984, was a Union Finance Minister in the Chandra Shekhar and AB Vajpayee Governments during 1990-91 and 1998-2002 respectively, while he was the External Affairs Minister in the Vajpayee Government between July 2002 and May 2004. He quit the Bharatiya Janata Party on April 21, 2018.
Even while he was in the BJP, Sinha had undertaken a three-day-long agitation to press for the demands of the farmers in the suicide-hit district of Akola in Vidarbha region in December 2017. Through his agitation, Sinha had forced the BJP-led Government to accept all his seven demands.