Cong will unite parties against CAB, pan-India NRC: Ramesh

The Congress would take the lead in uniting parties against the Citizenship Amendment Bill and the proposed pan-India National Register of Citizens (NRC), senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said here on Saturday.

"The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is using diversionary tactics to shift attention from issues, like economy and unemployment. They are using the CAB and the NRC to divert the peoples' attention," said Ramesh.

"The CAB is unconstitutional and the Congress will oppose it. In Haryana and Maharashtra, people have rejected the BJP rhetoric. The BJP was also routed in West Bengal by-elections," he said.

Stating that for the BJP, the CAB and the NRC are tools to divide the society, Ramesh said the Congress would take the lead in bringing together like-minded parties in opposing the CAB and the NRC in Parliament.

On realising the BJP's nature that it gobbles up its allies, Naveen Patnaik severed ties, the veteran Congress leader said. "The Shiv Sena and Bihar Chief minister Nitish Kumar must also realise it," he said.

Ramesh said the CAB must be send to select committee. "The BJP is trying to discard Assam's NRC and blame NRC co-ordinator Prateek Hajela," he said.

Assam Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma recently said the Accountant General had detected huge anomalies in the NRC prepared by Hajela. While arguing that there is the need to correct the error in the NRC, he advocated that Assam must be part of the pan-India exercise.-IANS