Bengaluru: After just days of passing the Citizenship Amendment Bill, Union home minister Amit Shah has assured people of northeastern states that he would accommodate their requests with a view to ease tensions in the area. 

Amit Shah in a rally said, “Conrad Sangma (Meghalaya chief minister) and his ministers met me on Friday and informed me about the problems they are facing... I tried to make them understand that there is no issue. When they insisted that some changes need to be made to the law, I asked them to meet me after Christmas. I have assured them that we will hold constructive discussions on the matter and come up with solutions to Meghalaya’s problems".

Amit Shah was not done yet. He squarely blamed the Congress for the ongoing unrest in the northeast states. He said, “When we tabled the CAB Congress seemed to have got a stomach ache. For years, people who faced religious persecution in other countries were living like refugees. Should they not be made citizens? Congress says we are anti-Muslims. We brought in CAB and they instigated violence in the northeastern states.” 

The Citizenship Amendment Bill, now a law, aims to give citizenship to religiously persecuted non-Muslims in the countries of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. 

The bill was passed in Lok Sabha with 311 in favour of it and 80 against while in Rajya Sabha, it was passed with 125 in favour of the bill and 105 against it. 

The Congress has always criticised the BJP for the abrogation of articles 370 and 35A, abolition of triple talaq and now, the implementation of CAB. In an interview with India Today, former Union finance minister P Chidambaram said there was no hurry to bring in such laws when the country was facing economic slowdown. He asked  the PM to concentrate on improving the economic health of the country first.