AMNA NAWAZ: In India, political unrest continues, after a citizenship law passed Parliament
earlier this month. It expedites a path to citizenship for religious minorities living
in India, but excludes Muslims.
Today, thousands turned out nationwide to protest the new law.
"NewsHour" correspondent Lisa Desjardins takes a closer look at the rule opponents say discriminates
against Muslims.
LISA DESJARDINS: Across India today, a physical and digital clamp-down, in New Delhi, scenes
of police beatings and pushback, as officers tried to contain protests against the nation's
new citizenship law.
Elsewhere, mass demonstrations, like this one in Kolkata, were largely peaceful, though
communications are spotty. The government again shut down all mobile Internet services
in several cities, all of this a clash over the identity and a citizenship law the government
says protects non-Muslim immigrants.
But, to opponents, the law is a thinly veiled attack on Muslims and a move toward making
India a religious Hindu state.
ABHIJIT MUKHERJEE, Indian Parliament Member (through translator): Until they withdraw
the Citizenship Amendment Act, the rallies will continue to take place. These protests
will continue. This is our right. The constitution of the country is impartial. There is tolerance.
LISA DESJARDINS: The new law focuses on India's Muslim neighbors, Afghanistan, Bangladesh
and Pakistan, and non-Muslim immigrants from those countries.
It protects six religious groups. Importantly, this comes as India is undergoing a national
registration, asking every person to prove citizenship. That means non-Muslims without
paperwork can get citizenship, but Muslims without documents may be in legal trouble.
The resulting protests have left at least 23 people dead, thousands arrested, and now
more charges of police violence. In Northern India, the BBC reports that Muslim families
in several towns say police attacked their homes, destroying cars, smashing property
and beating teenage boys.
Security video in that region last week shows Indian police smashing cameras during protests.
India's popular Prime Minister Narendra Modi is known as a Hindu nationalist, and defends
the law as protecting his country, but opponents say it rips India's multicultural fabric.
IRSHAD, Protester (through translator): Our country has unity in diversity. People of
different religions live here together, and it is known for this in the world.
LISA DESJARDINS: India, home to 1.4 billion, is wrestling with its own power and people.
Let's take a closer look at the issue now with Alyssa Ayres. She's a senior fellow at
the Council on Foreign Relations and served as deputy assistant secretary of state for
South Asia during the Obama administration.
You know, I want to first start by gauging this moment in India. As we just had in our
story, we are now seeing reports that police themselves may be attacking Muslim homes,
particularly in the province of Uttar Pradesh. Many people know that as the home of the Taj
Mahal.
What do you make of these reports of police violence? Is this a new phase, a new concern?
What does this mean?
ALYSSA AYRES, Council on Foreign Relations: It is disturbing, absolutely.
Uttar Pradesh is India's most populous state. This is the size of a country, about 200 million
people. It also has a larger Muslim minority population, about 20 percent of the state.
And the reports that have been coming out over the past couple days, with some video,
suggests that police are really overstepping the bounds of just mere crowd control. We're
seeing reports of property destruction, that police are destroying cameras, so they can't
be seen.
Again, there may be cases of crowds that get unruly, but police should be in the business
of crowd control, not trying to damage homes of individuals. So this is a real eye-opener,
I think, for a lot of people.
LISA DESJARDINS: You have recently been in India. What is your sense of the state of
tension there?
I mean, India is known for its multicultural fabric, but it's also highly flammable, that
fabric. What is your sense of the tensions now, especially between Hindu and Muslim there?
ALYSSA AYRES: I think what we have seen happen with the protests that have taken place across
the country, in many different cities across the country, very peaceful protests, as your
package showed, we are really seeing Indians, in fact, largely young Indians, stand up and
say, here's who we are and here's who we don't want to be.
People are standing up for a constitutional principle of secularism. In some of the protests
that we have seen in India, people are reading out parts of the constitution. That's an incredible
thing.
You see crowds of tens of thousands of people all together focusing on the constitutional
principle of secularism and equality before the law. So there are tensions in India. There
have been longstanding tensions in India between Hindus and Muslims.
But I think what this particular issue has highlighted is that there are a large number
of people in India who want to see their country retain its secularism.
LISA DESJARDINS: You have talked specifically about young people.
And I know you have followed this country and this region for decades. How significant
are these protests? It's not the first time we have seen large protests in India over
issues. But how significant you think these are, the scale of them, and the involvement
of young people?
ALYSSA AYRES: I think this is the history of the present at the moment, right? But maybe
we will know more about the scale once we have passed through this moment.
But it does seem that these protests are being located in universities, being student-led,
student-organized in many cases. And it's quite an inspirational thing to see young
Indians standing up and saying that they want to see their country evolve in a particular
direction, and they want to see it remain true to its constitution.
LISA DESJARDINS: And secular.
ALYSSA AYRES: And secular.
LISA DESJARDINS: Prime Minister Modi, of course, is someone who is sort of at the center of
all of this.
He ran and won, in part, on his economic and jobs agenda. But, of course, he's also known
as a Hindu nationalist. He talks a lot about having sort of Hindu pride and wanting the
identity of India to be Hindu.
What do you think these protests do for him? Or do they cause problems, questions about
what he's doing, in terms of his political strength in India?
ALYSSA AYRES: He enjoys a single-party majority in the lower house of Indian Parliament. So
the protests don't affect his single-party majority.
However, it has -- now we have seen, at the state level, his party has last several elections
recently. So they are no longer as dominant both at the federal government, as well as
throughout many states of India as well.
So we're seeing people make different kinds of choices in the parties that they want to
lead at the center of the country for their own states. And, in some cases, they are opting
against the BJP at the state level.
LISA DESJARDINS: Which is Modi's party, the BJP.
ALYSSA AYRES: Which is Modi's party, exactly.
LISA DESJARDINS: Yes.
ALYSSA AYRES: So, the other thing I would note is that the first government that Prime
Minister Modi led -- he was elected in 2014 -- his platform in 2014 was very focused on
economic growth, good governance, in contrast to what had been a series of corruption scandals
taking place from 2011 forward, the previous government.
And his economic plans haven't quite panned out. India is facing an economic downturn.
They're not seeing the growth levels that they need to employ this large youth demographic,
10 to 12 million people coming of work force age every year. And India is facing some severe
issues economically within the financial sector. It's trickling throughout the economy.
So what you have seen with the new Modi government is a real shift of emphasis towards the cultural,
the religious, nationalist agenda. And I think what these protests show us is that many young
people in India are saying, this is too much. This is not who we want to be.
LISA DESJARDINS: Alyssa Ayres of the Council on Foreign Relations, also an author, former
State Department, thank you very much.
ALYSSA AYRES: Thank you.