‘Constitution does not allow such laws…’: Home Minister Parameshwara on UCC

TUMAKURU: Home Minister and Congress leader Dr G Parameshwara on Friday said that the Constitution provides the opportunity to practice any faith people want and it does not allow laws such as the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) to be brought in a democratic country.

“Our Constitution provides an opportunity to practice any faith you want to. You have also allowed those people to stay in India. They are born, brought up, and dying here and you try to meddle with their social life, and societal commitments. Do you want to call them second-set grade citizens in this country? The Constitution does not provide for such laws to be brought in and why do you want to send them to Pakistan? If they are against the law of the land, punish them,” the minister said.

#WATCH | On Uniform Civil Code, Karnataka HM and Congress leader Dr G Parameshwara says, "Our Constitution provides an opportunity to practice any faith you want to. You have also allowed those people to stay in India. They are born, brought up, dying here and you try to meddle… pic.twitter.com/O8lwFPsa7R

— ANI (@ANI) April 12, 2024

Coming down heavily on the central government, Parameshwara said that either the BJP does not think of India as a democratic country or they don’t want a democracy. “BJP leadership thinks that this is not a democracy or they don’t want a democracy. That is why now we as Congressmen keep saying that democracy is in danger, protect the democracy”, he said.

When asked about whether the Agniveer scheme, is an option to reduce unemployment in the country, the minister said that there’s a ceiling in the Army, Navy, and Air Force regarding the limited recruitment, so first the government should fill those vacancies.

“How will you do that? You already have a ceiling in the Army, Navy and Air Force that you can recruit only these many people. There are 30 lakh sanctioned vacant places in the Government of India. Why don’t you fill them? What stops you from filling those vacancies? Instead of Agniveer, already sanctioned vacancies are there in govt, fill them up and give them employment. There are people who are well qualified. My appeal to PM Modi is to fill these vacancies so that at least youngsters will get employment”, he said.

The Agniveer scheme was announced in June 2022 for recruitment in the armed forces. The scheme is meant only for recruiting soldiers and not officers in the forces. The soldiers recruited under this Agneepath scheme are known as Agniveers.

Under the scheme, the three services are recruiting youths between the age bracket of 17-and-half years and 21 years for four years with a provision to retain 25 per cent of them for 15 more years. For 2022, the upper age limit was extended to 23 years.

Karnataka, which has 28 Lok Sabha seats, will vote in two phases on April 26 and May 7. The Lok Sabha Elections 2024 will be held in seven phases starting on April 19. The counting of votes on June 4. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress and JD-S fought together against the BJP and the combine was decimated. The BJP had won a record 25 seats; Congress and JD-S won just one seat each. (ANI)