SHILLONG, March 19 - Meghalaya Chief Minister Mukul Sangma on Friday said absence of the National Population Register (NPR) and National Register of Citizens (NRC) makes it difficult to verify as to who is an Indian citizen and who is not.
�We talked about dealing with illegal immigration of foreigners in a country having 125 crore population but irony is we are yet to even have the NRC,� Sangma told the Assembly.
In a supplementary reply, the Chief Minister said that in the absence of NPR and NRC, it becomes difficult on how to legally verify as to �who is an Indian citizen and who is not.�
Hill State Peoples Democratic Party chief Ardent M Basaiawmoit while raising a supplementary query demanded the government to come out clear on its stand in respect to the recent amendment brought by the Centre.
Alleging that the whole exercise of the amendment was to pave way for Hindus persecuted outside to get rehabilitated in India, Basaiawmoit said there is a lot of protest because the local indigenous population will be threatened.
Prior to NRC, Sangma said we need to have NPR, which enables to have proper record of Indian nationals as it also provides us classification of different categories of the people.
The CM, however, lamented that this could not be taken up because of the apprehensions expressed from different quarters, adding due to this the State is not able to arrive at a collective decision in completing the NPR.
Stating there is complete clarity on the part of the State Government, he said, �We are moving with utmost caution and commitment and therefore we will need to further discuss and engage on the approach.� � PTI
