Ferrão asked the government to “listen to the voice of millions in India, to stop quashing the right to dissent and, above all, to immediately and unconditionally revoke the CAA and desist from implementing the NRC and the NPR”. (Source: YouTube)

GOA Archbishop Filipe Néri Ferrão has asked the government to abstain from implementing the “divisive and discriminatory” NRC as it will “result in direct victimisation of the underprivileged classes” and create a vacuum with citizens becoming stateless. Ferrão asked the government to “listen to the voice of millions in India, to stop quashing the right to dissent and, above all, to immediately and unconditionally revoke the CAA and desist from implementing the NRC and the NPR”.

“The very fact that the CAA uses religion goes against the secular fabric of the country. It goes against the spirit and heritage of our land which, since times immemorial, has been a welcoming home to all, founded on the belief that the whole world is one big family. Such exercises will result in a direct victimisation of the underprivileged classes, particularly the Dalits, the Adivasis, the migrant labourers, the nomadic communities and the countless undocumented people, who, after having been recognised as worthy citizens and voters for more than 70 years in this great nation, will suddenly run the risk of becoming stateless and candidates for detention camps in their teeming millions,” Ferrão said in a statement issued by the Church.