Kolkata: Ten days after Mamata Banerjee rejected the opposition's demand, the Bengal Chief Minister has said a resolution against Citizenship Amendment Act or CAA would be passed in the state assembly within the next three or four days.
On January 9, Ms Banerjee had said there was no need for an anti-CAA resolution as the state assembly passed a resolution against the bill and the National Registry of Citizens (NRC) back in September.
The opposition had pointed out that in September, there was no CAA. But Ms Banerjee was unmoved.
She appears to have changed her mind in face of first Kerala and then Punjab passing resolutions against contentious citizenship law over the last few weeks.
Earlier on Monday, the Chief Minister had appealed to governments of the northeastern and opposition-ruled states to reject the National Registry of Citizens (NRC) and National Population Register (NPR), which will be carried out across the country later this year.
"Before taking a decision, know the law. The NPR is a dangerous game and it is totally related to the NRC and the CAA. Pass a resolution everywhere to withdraw it," the Chief Minister said speaking to reporters at the Kolkata airport before flying to Bagdogra for a three-day visit to north Bengal.
Last week, at a meeting of the opposition convened by the Congress, it was decided that Chief Ministers who have refused to allow NRC and the CAA in their states must suspend the process of National Population Register.
Ms Banerjee had not attended the meeting, upset with the state leaders of the Congress and the Left.
"I was the first to launch an andolan (movement) against CAA NRC," she said. "What the Left and the Congress are doing in the name of the CAA-NRC is not a movement but vandalism."
She had also skipped the January 17 meeting of the centre on the NPR, saying, "Let them (the Centre) pull my government down if they like".
The National Population Register was expected to do the groundwork for the National Register of Citizens, the big government initiative that has been rolled out in Assam. The government said procedure is meant to flush out illegal migrants from the country, but critics have said that it is skewed against the Muslims.
In December, the Union cabinet approved a proposal to update the NPR that will be conducted in every state except Assam. But following widespread protests over the NRC and contentious citizens' list, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah said there is no talk of countrywide NRC as of now.