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The Union government is increasing public spending in unnecessary sectors which will increase the debt of the nation. India is one of the most indebted countries. According to the recent government survey, the union government had raised the debt from Rs.55 lakh crores in 2014 to 83 lakh crores in January 2019.

The amount spent on issuing a uniform identity card (Aadhaar) to all the citizens of India and to form a separate body for it is Rs. 9,055 crores. Despite spent heavily, a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court including former chief justice Deepak Mishra delivered a verdict regarding Aadhaar on Monday, September 2018. This judgment has overturned a number of reasons for introducing the Aadhaar card. If we examine this judgment on the basis of certain statistics, it will prove that still, more new problems are there.

In India, 50 per cent of the population lives below the poverty line. The complete public distribution system is still not implemented in most of the states except Tamil Nadu, Kerala and some other states. The relevant figures have not yet been properly collected.

Only 2.2 per cent of the total Indian population is taxpayers. The Supreme Court judgment has insisted that income taxpayers should link the Aadhaar number with the Permanent Account Number (PAN). Till today, it remains a mystery how forcing the Aadhaar number for this 2.2 per cent of the population will benefit the income tax authorities.

They announced that Aadhaar card would no longer be mandatory for commercial banks which engaged in internet money transfer. In a way, this is to the advantage of black money holders. This is because the Income Tax Department cannot identify the tax evaders and tax avoiders through the bank account website based on the Aadhaar card.

There are 82 crore people using mobile phones in India. The judgment also stated that the Aadhaar number was not necessary to obtain SIM card for the mobile phone users. The police and the security forces have said that the culprits can be easily traced if the mobile number is linked to the Aadhaar number to find the mobile number by means of Aadhaar number, but that reason also a question mark here?

The judgment also states that students who write the various entrance exams of the union government and to enroll students in schools do not need Aadhaar and also Aadhaar is not mandatory to enroll students in schools. Thus the use of this Aadhaar card became largely useless.

Most of the poor who receive government welfare schemes live in huts and unsafe housing. Habitats of the poor are often affected by heavy rain, storms and fires.

In Tamil Nadu, in the districts of Thanjavur, Pudukottai and Thiruvarur, the houses of the people were badly damaged by the Gaja storm. Aadhaar cards were also missing. Therefore, those living in secure houses do not need an Aadhaar card. At the same time, the need for Aadhaar card to get government welfare schemes for the people living in unsafe residences causes many administrative problems and contradictions to the state governments. Because of this card which deprives states’ rights, practically we can see the disadvantages outweigh the benefits.

In the midst of such problems, the Union government is currently trying to implement the National Citizens' Register scheme. Massive opposition to this scheme has arisen in the North-Eastern states. Especially in the state of Assam, the democratically functioning Asom Gana Parishad has distanced itself from the BJP alliance. Everyone mentions that the land rights and other rights of the land miners will be greatly affected by this law.

After the partition of Pakistan in India and the formation of Bangladesh, millions of people from those countries migrated to West Bengal and Assam as refugees. A series of mass protests erupted in Assam in 1980 due to refugees. The protest was organized by the students in the situation where the number of immigrants will outnumber the population of Assam. Students who carried out this struggle later formed the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) party and came to power in the state of Assam. Magazines around the world hailed Assam students as another student revolution similar to the anti-Hindi struggle in Tamil Nadu after Indian independence.

However, the terrorist group ULFA has kept a request on a separate country by keeping their separate army like Nagaland and continued to attack the Indian army and the security forces. Their influence began to decrease as the Assam issue was resolved smoothly.

According to several media reports, the people of Assam are once again in a position to support the terrorist ULFA movement due to the amendment to the National Register of Citizens Act. The ruling BJP-led government is currently facing strong opposition in the north-eastern states to this amendment. There has been great outrage among the people with the announcement that the amendment will only allow Hindus who have left countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan to be registered as national citizens. The reason for this was that the BJP dreamed of expanding the Hindu-Islamic divide and conducting vote-bank politics by granting immigration rights only to Hindus, excluding Muslims.
But the tribal people in the north-eastern states have begun to protest against this by assuming that their economic situation will be severely affected. In this situation, the amount spent on this scheme for the state of Assam alone is 1221 crores.

This is a major blow to the BJP government, which thinks they can win politics by distorting India's pluralism and showing a Hindu identity. And many states, including Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, are now fighting for their need of special status.

Instead of finding a mutual solution to the problems of the people of many states based on their cultural, linguistic and social identities of the respective states, the BJP is taking India on a path of disintegration by making the concept of one country, one religion and one language.

On February 18, 2019, the American Human Rights Fighter Martin Luther King Foundation delivered a lecture at the Bashir Ahmed Women's College in Chennai. The speaker, former Chief Secretary of Jammu and Kashmir Moosa Raza has argued that Articles 370 and 35 (a) of the Constitution, which guarantees the special status of the state of Kashmir, should not be changed. The reasons given by Moosa Raza for this are new. If these legal provisions are removed, the land in Kashmir will be bought by the US, Saudi and Indian big businessmen. He states that they will completely destroy the natural environment and environmental protection by building 5-star hotels, apartments, lodges, luxury homes and resorts for their own profit.

Moosa Raza is a retired Jammu and Kashmir Chief Secretary who was elected to the Indian Civil services. And he admired as the best administrator by all parties. There are many reasons for what he said. The Union government has reportedly registered several cases alleging land grabbing by higher military officials in the past when the Indian army is concentrated in Kashmir.

On Monday, February 2019, the author went to Telangana to publish an English book on state autonomy. All parties except the Congress and the BJP were present at the launch. They unanimously stressed that it was the imperative of time to give special status to the state of Telangana. The author is Vallala Nagaraj, and he is 23 years old. He holds a degree in law and is pursuing higher studies at Kakatiya University. A large number of students attended the function. They acted in a well-controlled manner until the end of the ceremony. North Indian employers in Hyderabad and other major districts are interested in buying land with the trillions of rupees they are investing in the business of finance. They are destroying the livelihoods of poor people. Local people are beginning to oppose this. If this situation continues, local people of Telangana will start a movement and set up domains against the north Indians as like the Shiv Sena operating in the state of Maharastra. Researchers and students noted that this would pose a great danger and would disrupt social peace.

They also noted that most of the norths Indians were dividing the people by giving funds to Hindutva Sangh Parivar organizations. The situation is similar in Tamil Nadu. I mentioned that north Indian bosses buy land for business speculation. A permanent solution to this problem can only be found by curbing such anti-people tendencies and giving each state a special status like Kashmir to protect the ecological and natural resources as Moosa Raza mentioned in his speech. Land miners can avoid being impoverished in their respective states. As a result, inequalities are likely to escalate the problems, and it will disrupt Indian unity. It is a blatant act of injustice of the BJP government to ignore such fundamental issues and accept only Hindus leaving Pakistan and Afghanistan as citizens in the name of the National Citizens Register.

Those who continued to be attacked by Sinhalese in Eelam after 1980 and settled in Tamil Nadu are still being held in refugee camps and facing many difficulties. How fair is it that the Union government intelligence bureau continues to monitor Tamils and take away their rights. People from Eelam are all Muslims? Christians? Aren't they Tamils Hindus? Seeking a solution through an amendment in the name of Hindus for migration to Assam and Will the hasty dumping of Rs 1222 crore lead to Indian unity?

Why have Eelam Tamils not been granted citizenship under the National Citizens Registration Scheme to date? Is Indian national unity the continued exclusion of Tamil Nadu and Eelam Tamils by the Union Government?

Written by Kuttuvan

Translated by Sarumathi

(This article was originally published in a Tamil Magazine 'Sinthanaiyalan', March 2019)

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