Senior Urdu journalist and writer Shirin Dalvi has decided to return her State Sahitya Akademi Award as a mark of protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, which was passed in Rajya Sabha on 11 December.
Calling the Bill ‘divisive and discriminatory’, Dalvi says that it is an attack on our Constitution and secularism.
She said that she decided to return the award, which she had received in 2011 for her literary contributions, to stand with her ‘community and fight for secularism and democracy’.
The Bill, which was cleared in Rajya Sabha on Wednesday, saw 125 MPs voting in its favour and 99 against it. It was passed in the Lok Sabha on the intervening night of 9-10 December.
The Bill seeks to provide Indian citizenship to non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.
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