TDP national president and former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu has said his party will stand by the Muslims with regard to the Uniform Civil Code (UCC), which is likely to be tabled as a Bill in the monsoon session of Parliament beginning July 20.
“The TDP will never work against the sentiments of the Muslims,” Mr. Naidu asserted at a gathering of the Muslim community elders, who called on him on July 19 (Wednesday) to apprise him of their views on the UCC.
He said the TDP would take a decision on the UCC after studying the suggestions made by the Muslims, saying that their welfare and development figured high on the party’s agenda.
The leaders of various Muslim groups appealed to Mr. Naidu to oppose the UCC, which, they insisted, would usurp their religious freedom and adversely affect non-Muslims also.
Mr. Naidu said the TDP was a secular party, which had been striving for the welfare of Muslims since its inception, and pointed out that it always stood for religious harmony, which was evident from the manner in which it worked for amity among various faiths when it was a part of the NDA.
The TDP would treat all religions with equal respect, and it fought for reservation for Muslims. It would never frame policies detrimental to the interests of the minorities, he stated.
Mr. Naidu said Muslims should be politically empowered in the real sense, and that the TDP had striven for their uplift in the all-important area of education.
He stated that Muslims should rise to a stage where they played a crucial role in public policy making.
On its part, the TDP would do what all it could to improve the living standards of Muslims, and it was wary of the consequences of taking a hasty decision as far as the UCC was concerned, he added.
