Last week, the Indian parliament passed the bill, which allowed citizenship for Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Christians, Sikhs and Parsis facing persecution in neighbouring countries

MEA summoned the Malaysian envoy after remarks made by the Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Bin Mohamad over the citizenship law.

According to MEA the remarks made by the Malaysian Prime Minister were “ill-informed and insensitive”.

Earlier, Mahathir Mohamad had criticised India's new citizenship law.

"People are dying because of this law. Why is there a necessity to do this when all the while, for 70 years, they have lived together as citizens without any problem?" Mahathir Mohamad said on the sidelines of the 2019 Kuala Lumpur Summit.

On Wednesday, the Indian Supreme Court refused to suspend the implementation of the citizenship law as amended, despite the ongoing unrest in the country.

The ongoing nationwide protests in India are a result of parliament passing last week's bill, which allowed citizenship for Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Christians, Sikhs and Parsis facing persecution in neighbouring countries. 

The law angered Indian Muslims, who believe that it violates the constitution, as it oppresses a group of citizens in a formally secular country on religious grounds. The residents of the country's northeastern states are fearing that now millions of people from Bangladesh could legally settle in their regions, which could threaten the interests of the local population.

Agencies