Union Home Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah on Friday said that the BJP will not back down even an inch on the issue of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), even if all the opposition parties came together against it to 'spread misinformation'.

"Even if all these parties come together, BJP will not move back even an inch on this issue of the Citizenship Amendment Act. You can spread as much misinformation as you want," Shah said on Friday while speaking at a rally in Jodhpur.

Shah also hit out at Congress for their recent fiasco involving disrespecting, on several counts, Vinayak "Veer" Damodar Savarkar, a Hindutva ideologue admired by both the BJP and Congress' new ally Shiv Sena. The Home Minister accused the Congress of playing vote bank politics in doing so. "For vote-bank politics, Congress party is speaking against a great personality like Veer Savarkar as well. Congressmen should be ashamed of themselves," he said.

Shah then notched up his attack on Congress leaders, specifically Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, over the unfortunate death of more than 100 infants in Kota. "Gehlot Ji, instead of opposing this (Citizenship Amendment Act), you should first focus on the children who are dying in Kota every day. Show some concern, mothers are cursing you," the BJP president said.

The Jodhpur rally was organised by the BJP to kickstart the saffron camp's national campaign to reach out to people as a means of countering "misleading" information against CAA. In line with this agenda, Amit Shah announced the launch of a special phone number for people to register their support for the CAA, simply by giving a missed call on the number. "I request people to give a befitting reply to Rahul Baba, Mamta Didi, Kejriwal's team, " continued the BJP president, "by giving a missed call from your mobile and registering your support for CAA."

To counter the intensifying protests across the country against the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leadership has now decided to hold a massive public awareness campaign from January 5-15 to dispel any widespread misconception regarding the act and to restore order in public life.

Top BJP leaders, including party president Amit Shah, working president JP Nadda and about 50 other politicos, will hold big events in several cities to promote the campaign. According to sources, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) might also join the BJP in the awareness campaign, at the end of which a huge public rally has been planned. The BJP has also planned to form different Public Relations groups specifically to reach out to different communities viz. Buddhists, Dalits, and other minority communities. In this manner, the saffron camp hopes to reach out to around three crore families.

Anti-CAA protests have intensified across India, with some of them turning violent, ever since the controversial Act came into effect on December 9. The ones protesting against the act claim that it is against the secular principles of our constitution and that it discriminates against Muslims, especially posing a risk after the National Register of Citizens (NRC) comes into effect. These claims have been refuted by the BJP. Several top leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have assured that Indian Muslims that they need not worry due to the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act as the government is committed to protecting the rights of everyone, including Muslims of this country.

The Citizenship (Amendment) Act aims to provide for Indian citizenship to the Hindus, Jains, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan after six years of residence in India instead of the current mandatory stay of 11 years even if they do not possess any document.