NEW DELHI: The controversial National Register for Citizens (NRC) process will be carried out across the country, Home Minister Amit Shah said on Wednesday.
He also told Parliament that the exercise will be done again in Assam, along with the entire country, adding “no one from any religion should be worried”.
Responding to several questions on the controversial exercise in the Rajya Sabha, Shah asserted that there would be no discrimination on the basis of religion. Even as Shah made a country-wide pitch for the NRC process, West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee said she will never allow NRC in her state.
When asked to give clarifications over his statement on proposed Citizenship Amendment Bill of giving citizenship to all except Muslims, Shah said the Centre accepts that refugees — Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Christians, Sikhs and Parsis — who left Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan due to religious atrocities in those countries should get Indian citizenship.
The Union minister, however, pointed out that there is no provision in the NRC, which says that people from other religions will not be included in the register.
“People from all religions who are Indian citizens will be included. There is no question of any discrimination on the basis of religion. NRC is a different process and the Citizenship Amendment Bill is different,” Shah clarified.
In a written reply to whether NRC provides citizenship to immigrants of six non-Muslim faiths, Minister of State for Home Affairs Kishan Reddy said, “NRC is a register containing details of Indian citizens. On its own, it does not provide citizenship to any foreigner including illegal migrants.”
In Assam, the NRC process was carried out as per the SC order, Shah said adding that when the updating process will be implemented in the entire country, Assam will also be included.
Meanwhile, Himanta Biswa Sarma, the finance minister of Assam, said that the state government has requested the Centre to reject the recently published NRC.