by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group
special report
Centre, states heading for a show-down
Home Ministry may create its own machinery for NRC
Harish Gupta
New Delhi, Dec 21
The Centre and some states may be heading for a show-down on the implementation of the amended Citizenship Act and NRC.
Since many of the non-BJP states including Kerala, West Bengal have expressed their unwillingness to implement the CAA and its off-shoot National Register of Citizens (NRC), the Centre is mulling creation of a new machinery.
If reports emanating from the North Block housing the Union Home Ministry are any indication, the Centre will designate its own officers to implement the CAA/NRC. Instead of the District Collectors or District Magistrates, the centre may assign the task to FRROs (Foreigners Regional Registration Offices) to conduct the exercise.
The Centre may be giving an impression of softing its approch. But there is no plans to dilute th CAA or alter the course of NRC or NPR. The NRC is not a time-bound exercise and no time-frame has been set out for this for counducting it across the country. Addressing a public rally in Jharkhand, Amit Shah said the NRC would be rolled out before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. This is a long shot but the Centre has not relented on conducting NRC across the country. Rather, the FRRO s who conduct physical verification of documents submitted by the foreigners. There are a dozen FRROs in the country. The Ministry of Home Affairs is considering to deploy these FRROs across the country and provide its own machinery for verification of documents.
While Bihar, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh reluctant to implement and Kerala declasring that it would not even implement National Population Register (NPR), the Centre is set ot create its own permanent machinery to conduct Census/NRC.
The NPR is an age-old exercise conducted by the Registrar General of India (RGI) under the Citizenship Act 1955 every ten years with the help of the state governments. The RGI had already issued notification for conducting NPR beginning April 2020 to September 2020 across the country barring Assam in July 2019. The NCR will follow only after the National Population Register (NPR) is available in 2021.
The Centre is busy creating an alternative machinery only in defiant states. There are 15 states where the BJP has its own governments and most of the Union Territories are also under its control. In these states the Centre can undertake Census and citizenship exercises with the existing set up of District Magistrates (DM s) andDistrict Collectors (DC s). But in remaining states, it will have to designate its own officers.
Ends
