NEW DELHI: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is expected to delay his official trip to India due to protests over a controversial citizenship law.
The official visit of the Japanese prime minister to attend a summit between him and Indian premier Narendra Modi scheduled on Sunday in Guwahati would be postponed due do the protests in the same city over citizenship law.
In this regard, according to the Indian government, the Citizenship Amendment Bill, approved by parliament earlier on Wednesday, was meant to protect minorities from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.
Read more: India to table controversial citizenship bill in parliament
The law seeks to grants Indian nationality to Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jains, Parsis, and Sikhs who fled the three countries before 2015. But thousands of protesters in the Indian state Assam said that the measure would open the region to a flood of foreign migrants.
Protesters in torched buildings and clashed with police in Assam which resulted in killing two people and injuring eleven.
The new law has also raised concerns that the Indian government was pushing a Hindu-first identity for India and fanning fears for the future of Muslims, the biggest minority group. Members of other faiths listed in the law, by contrast, have a clear path to citizenship.
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