Protests rage across India over citizenship law

Our live coverage of the day has ended. Thousands took to the streets in around 15 cities across India, in defiance of bans on public gatherings and reports of communication blackouts.To read more about why Indians are doing this you can click here.

Here’s some of the best images from the day:

Protestors rally to demand the withdrawal of the Citizenship Amendment Act in Kolkata on Thursday. Photo: Bikas Das/AP

Muslim protesters pray in the street, defying a curfew in Bangalore on Thursday.

Police and protesters clash in Bangalore. Photo: Manjunath Kiran/AFP via Getty Images

LGBTQ activists demonstrate against the Citizenship Amendment Act and National Register of Citizens in Kolkata. Photo: Bikas Das/AP

Police detain a protester at a demonstration in New Delhi on Thursday. Photo: Sajjad Hussain/AFP via Getty Images

The Chief Minister of Karnataka, B. S. Yediyurappa, called on citizens living in the southern state “to remain calm and maintain peace” in a tweet Thursday.

“I appeal to the people, particularly those in Mangaluru (Mangalore), to maintain harmony and to refrain from destroying public property,” Yediyurappa, who is a member of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, wrote.

He denounced the violence in the city of Mangalore and said “false propaganda is being spread about the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. Do not pay heed to politically motivated, provocative statements from anyone.’”

Protesters against the Citizenship Amendment Act clashed with police and burned buildings in the state of Uttar Pradesh on Thursday.

Police were pelted with stones and vehicles were set alight in Lucknow, a city in Uttar Pradesh, after they defied the section 144 order which bans large public gatherings, according to a spokesperson for Lucknow police. 

The police spokesperson told CNN the situation is now under control in Lucknow.

Meanwhile in Sambhal, also in Uttar Pradesh, buses were torched by protesters.

A bus burns in Sambhal, a city in Uttar Pradesh.

A damaged vehicle is seen in Sambhal.

Opposition parties criticized the Indian government on Thursday as protestors defied bans on assembly and the country experienced internet blackouts.

Rahul Gandhi, a leading figure of the main opposition Congress Party, called reports of telecoms blackouts an “insult to India’s soul.”

In a press conference earlier in the day, senior Congress party leader Abhishek Singhvi, said, “you have redefined the definition of normalcy, the J&K (Jammu and Kashmir) definition of normalcy now prevails in the rest of the country,” he said in reference to a media blackout in the disputed region.

“This is an uncaring and unthinking government,” he added.

Derek O’Brien, senior leader of West Bengal state’s ruling All India Trinamool Congress party, tweeted a new profile photo of him wearing a shirt.

The shirt said, “no CAB no NRC,” in reference to the citizenship bill (CAB) and a national register of citizens (NRC) Indian Home Minister Amit Shah has repeatedly promised to implement across the country.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) tweeted images of the protests happening in the West Bengal’s capital Kolkata, the southern state of Tamil Nadu and the northern city of Lucknow.

As many as 60,000 people protested against the citizenship law in the city of Malegaon in Maharashtra state Thursday, police told Agence France-Presse.

Meanwhile, thousands amassed in India’s largest city of Mumbai, also in Maharashtra, on Thursday.

Eyewitnesses told CNN they estimated up to 4,000 people took part in the protest in the southern part of Mumbai.

“We cannot stay silent or on the fringes anymore. We have to act now,” Aman Verma, a financial advisor, told AFP.

“Something has changed. This is the first time in a long time that people in Mumbai have come out in such large numbers to register dissent,” consultant Karishma V. told AFP.

Here are some images taken from the gathering in Mumbai:

New Delhi’s Chief Minister chose the wrong day to launch a citywide free wifi scheme.

Soon after Arvind Kejriwal launched the program on Thursday, CNN’s team in New Delhi noticed it had been turned off.

The government ordered the suspension of mobile and data services in parts of the capital as protests began, according local media reports.

On Thursday, telecoms company Vodafone India tweeted that its services had been suspended in several parts of New Delhi “as per the directive received from the government.”

In a video shared on Twitter, Kejriwal voiced his concern about the citizenship act:

“Today, the state of law and order in the entire country, not just in Delhi, but in entire country, has been ruined,” he said.

“All citizens are afraid they will be asked to prove they are citizens of this country,” he said in reference to the fear that the act could pave the way for a nationwide citizenship test.

Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Yogi Adityanath (left) and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Around a dozen vehicles, including two buses, were burned down amid violence in India’s biggest and most populous state, Uttar Pradesh.  

Yogi Adityanath, its chief minister, condemned violence on Thursday, accusing “unconstitutional elements” of “creating a state of fear” in a televised statement.

He reiterated the line of his party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), that the citizenship act does not target people based on “religion, caste, or creed, it gives security to every citizen of the country, the people who have come to this country, by assimilating them it takes forward the traditions of the country,” he said.

In the city of Lucknow around 12 vehicles, including eight two-wheeled vehicles, a bus, and up to four vans, were burned, he said.

Adityanath said the perpetrators must pay for the damage caused. He is a polarizing Hindu religious leader, known for his provocative rhetoric against Muslims.

Celebrity historian Ramachandra Guha was dragged away by uniformed officers in the southern city of Bengaluru while in the middle of an interview with Indian broadcaster NDTV.

In a video shared by the channel, Guha struggled as he was hustled away by a group of police officers, who pushed him in the direction of a bus.

It is unclear what happened next. CNN has contacted Bengaluru police for more information. Guha has not answered CNN’s calls.

The southern city of Bengaluru had denied permission for civil marches set for Thursday, after protests against the controversial new citizenship law turned violent in recent days.

In an attempt to quell protests, the city banned large gatherings for two days from Thursday.

Demonstrators in Agartala, in India's northeast state of Tripura, on December 10, 2019. Photo: Stringer/AFP via Getty Images

People are all protesting against the citizenship bill that passed last week – but for different reasons.

Muslim marginalization: The new law will make it more difficult for Muslim migrants to get Indian citizenship, so some critics are protesting that it is further marginalizing the Muslim community.

They’re also worried it might pave the way for nationwide citizenship tests, stripping the rights of Muslims who have lived in India for generations but cannot prove their family’s lineage – making countless people stateless.

Influx of migrants: In the country’s northeast, many indigenous groups fear that giving citizenship to large numbers of immigrants would change the unique ethnic make-up of the region and their way of life – regardless of religion.

These protests were especially strident in the states of Assam and Tripura, which both share a border with Bangladesh.

Images from protests last week show crowds holding signs that read, “We are Assamese and proud” and “Tripura is not the dumping ground of illegal migrants.”

Heavy traffic in New Delhi has prompted airlines Air India and Indigo to offer a full refund for all outbound domestic and international flights on Thursday.

Meanwhile, many schools in the cities of New Delhi, Gurgaon and Noida will be shut tomorrow, according to several parents who spoke to CNN. 

Strong statements and heavy symbolism are on display as hundreds of people converge in central New Delhi – in defiance of a ban on public gatherings.

Here are some pictures taken by CNN’s team on the ground in New Delhi:

The founder of Swaraj Abhiyaan, a group that organized the march in New Delhi, said he was detained by police around the Red Fort area of the city.

“I have just been detained from Lal Qila (Red Fort). About a thousand protesters already detained. Thousands on the way. Am told we are being taken to Bawana (police station), ” Yogendra Yadav, who is the President of the political arm of the group, Swaraj India, wrote in a tweet Thursday.

“Common detainment, common sacrifice, common citizenship,” he wrote in Hindi.

A colonial-era law that prevents gatherings of four or more people – known as Section 144 – has been imposed in a number of areas in New Delhi in a bid to quell unrest.

Yadav told CNN before the march that “Section 144 being imposed by the police is an attempt to thwart our march. This will not deter us. We will gather there for our march.”

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Brazil on November 14. Photo: Pavel Golovkin/Pool/AFP via Getty Images

The newly adopted citizenship bill – and the protests that have now followed – present a high-stakes test for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Modi’s emphasis on empowering India’s Hindu majority has long alarmed its Muslim minority. Modi’s administration stripped the country’s only Muslim-majority state of autonomy, and rolled out a citizenship check in Assam state, leaving nearly 2 million mostly Muslim people effectively stateless.

Now, the law seems to have pushed people over the edge, with violent protests spreading across multiple states.

A surprise challenge: The protests seem to have caught Modi somewhat off guard. The leader has enjoyed widespread support, even when his public initiatives have hurt citizens – and the economy.

Even when Modi stripped Jammu and Kashmir – India’s only Muslim-majority state – of its partial autonomy in August, few people took to the streets. This may explain why the government failed to anticipate the potential backlash to the citizenship bill.

But his words appear to have had little effect, with protests ramping up even more.

Protesters march against India's new citizenship law in Kolkata on December 17. Photo: Dibyangshu Sarkar/AFP via Getty Images

People across India have been protesting since last week, when the controversial citizenship bill was signed into action.

Hundreds of people were injured and dozens arrested on Sunday after police stormed a university campus in New Delhi, firing tear gas. And on Tuesday, further violent clashes between protesters and police broke out in the district of North East Delhi.

In the northeastern state of Assam ongoing protests have turned deadly, with at least five people killed, police said.

The widespread civil action comes a day after India’s Supreme Court refused to halt implementation of the citizenship law, though it will hear a raft of petitions that question the law’s constitutionality.

Phone services have been cut in New Delhi and internet reception is down in other parts of the country amid widespread protests against India’s controversial citizenship law.

For residents of the country’s more restive areas, particularly Indian-controlled Kashmir, this is a familiar experience. India leads the world in terms of internet blackouts, cutting off mobile and broadband web access more than any other country.

Kashmir shutdown: An ongoing internet blackout in Indian-controlled Kashmir is now the longest ever in a democracy – at more than 135 days – according to Access Now, an advocacy group which tracks internet freedom.

Kashmiris have been without internet access for so long that WhatsApp has reportedly begun deleting their accounts for inaction. Some residents were unaware even of the cause for the blackout – India’s rewriting of the constitution to remove Kashmir’s protected autonomy – and Kashmiris have been largely removed from the conversation since then, so difficult is it for people in the region to get their messages out. 

A violation of rights: Internet shutdowns breach key rights guaranteed by the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other key international treaties.

Having rights and enforcing them are quite different, however. In India, some individual shutdowns have been challenged in the courts, and there is an ongoing effort to change the country’s law on internet shutdowns to make them more difficult to impose.

Internet shutdowns are a growing trend around the world – a piece in the Chinese state-run People’s Daily this week said that India’s example showed “shutting down the internet in a state of emergency should be standard practice for sovereign countries.”

Protests against a controversial citizenship law are planned in at least 15 Indian cities today including the capital New Delhi.

Protesters form a human chain in New Delhi

New Delhi: In the Indian capital, protests are taking place in several areas around the city including the historic Red Fort and Jantar Mantar, which is a popular protest site. 

Bengalaru: Protests in the southern city of Bengalaru have resulted in at least 70 arrests. 

Lucknow: In India’s biggest and most populous state Uttar Pradesh, demonstrators defied restrictions in the capital Lucknow. Police said protesters threw stones in the Hasanganj area of the city. 

Protesters defy bans on public gatherings in New Delhi.

Other protests are kicking off or planned in Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Patna, Varanasi, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, and other regions.

Protesters gather in New Delhi against a new citizenship law that critics say discriminates against Muslims.

Public anger is mounting over a controversial citizenship law that was passed by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week.

But what is the law and why is it so controversial?

Indian citizenship: The law promises to fast-track Indian citizenship for religious minorities, including Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians, from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who arrived before 2015.

Protecting refugees: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government said the law will protect religious minorities who fled persecution in their home countries.

Anti-Muslim: Critics, however, say the law marginalizes Muslims and undermines the country’s secular constitution.

Wider fears: Many Indian Muslims have linked the new law to Indian Home Minister Amit Shah’s repeated promise to implement a nationwide register of citizens, a process by which residents will need to provide the government with evidence that they are living in India legally. The government has insisted that the policy is intended only to root out illegal immigrants. So far the registry has only been implemented in Assam, where earlier this year, an estimated 1.9 million people were excluded from the list – the majority of whom were Muslim, and therefore not protected under the new citizenship law.

Protests for different reasons: The law has sparked widespread opposition, especially in the country’s northeastern states. Many indigenous groups there fear that giving citizenship to large numbers of immigrants, who came over the porous border with Bangladesh following independence in 1971, would change the unique ethnic make-up of the region and their way of life, regardless of religion.

Transport has been disrupted and selective cell phone services have been shut down as protests get underway in the capital.

Telecoms company Vodafone India tweeted earlier today that its services were suspended in several parts of the capital city New Delhi “as per the directive received from the government.”

This comes amid multiple local media reports that the government ordered the suspension of mobile and data services across the city.

Vodafone tweeted in a reply to a customer that services were stopped in six locations. CNN has reached out to local authorities for confirmation.

Several Delhi metro stations were also closed in areas near to the planned protest route, with Delhi Metro Rail Corporation citing “sudden safety and security reasons.”

Police and security forces gather near Red Fort, New Delhi, at a demonstration on December 19, 2019.

Crowds have gathered outside New Delhi’s iconic Red Fort in defiance of a rarely evoked colonial-era ban prohibiting gatherings of four or more people.

People there say they have a right to protest.

“What they’re doing is wrong. We oppose the Citizenship Amendment Act. We oppose not being allowed to protest. We are Indian and Muslim. We can be both. All religions can live in India,” said local Delhi resident Rubina Zafar.

And it’s not just Muslims who are protesting the law in the capital.

Sidharth Singh, 23, said he is a Hindu but opposes the law and what he described as a growing sense of divisiveness.

“I have my freedom to protest. It is my fundamental right,” said Singh. “This is not democracy. Why does the government think it is higher than the constitution?”

Singh said he supported Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he was first elected in 2014. But he is not happy with how India is now being governed.

“We saw hope. He (Modi) would put India on progressive path. But five years down the line? Our social fabric has been disturbed. They have outrightly divided two communities,” he said.