RANCHI: After getting no response from the center for initiating an exercise for preparing National Register of Citizens (NCR) in the State, Jharkhand Government has now decided to approach Supreme Court by filing an intervener petition into a case related to Assam's NCR Draft currently pending there.
Chief Minister Raghubar Das has directed Sate Officials to initiate the process of filing an application in the Apex Court. Looking at increasing number of infiltrators in some of the bordering districts of Jharkhand, the Chief Minister has asked Chief Secretary Sudhir Tripathi and Home Secretary SKG Rahate to file an intervener petition in the NCR matter pending in the Supreme Court pleading that Jharkhand should also be made a party in it.
Following his directions, the State Government has started making preparations for it to seek permission for preparing NCR in Jharkhand also on the lines of Assam. Notably, the State Government had written Ministry of Home Affairs three months back for its approval to begin exercise of preparing NCR for the State, but it is yet to get any reply in this regard.
"We have already put in a request to Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India, in the office of Registrar General and Census Commissioner seeking their approval for starting an exercise, following which the process of preparing NCR in Jharkhand will begin," said Home Secretary SKG Rahate. He, however, refused to comment whether any direction has been received from the Chief Minister for filing Intervener petition in Supreme Court in this regard. Advocate General Ajit Kumar, asserting that that State Government believed that an inquiry on the lines of Assam must be conducted in Jharkhand also to check huge infiltration from Bangladesh, but at the same time, said that so far he had not received any directions in this regard.
Notably, Sahebganj, Pakur and Godda are the worst hit districts where hundreds of illegal migration of Bangladeshi infiltrators has taken place in Jharkhand. Seriousness of the State Government on the issue could be gauged by the fact that a SP rank official of Special Branch had been asked recently to study the process of preparing NCR by visiting Assam and submit a detailed report in this regard. State BJP has been raising the issues since long demanding the State Government to check the growing proportion of alleged Bangladeshi immigrants in the three districts in 'Santhal Pargana' Division sharing boundaries with West Bengal.