Centre will throw “every single illegal immigrant out”: Amit Shah
GUWAHATI : Home Minister Amit Shah has declared the centre will throw “every single illegal immigrant out” of the country, breaking his silence over the controversial National Register of Citizens (NRC) list that was released on August 31 and declared more than 19 lakh people as foreigners.
“Various people have raised all kinds of questions on the National Register of Citizens (NRC). I want to clearly say that not a single illegal migrant will be allowed to stay in the country by the Government of India. That is our commitment,” Amit Shah said at a North Eastern Council meeting in Guwahati today.
On August 5 Mr Shah announced the government would scrap Article 370 and bifurcate Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories, sparking the imposition of a state-wide security lockdown that included the detention of senior political leaders and leading to massive protests from the Opposition.
Mr Shah also declared that the centre had no intention of altering or scrapping Article 371 of the Indian Constitution, which grants special privileges to north eastern states. He said there was a vast difference between Articles 370 and 371.
“I have clarified in Parliament that this is not going to happen and I am saying it again today in the presence of eight chief ministers of North East that the Centre will not touch Article 371,” the Home Minister added, amid concerns the centre would do to the North East what it did to Jammu and Kashmir.
Amit Shah is in Assam for a two-day visit – his first since becoming Home Minister – that was preceded by the state government declaring Assam a “Disturbed Area” under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act of 1958.
Post the release of the final NRC list, some BJP leaders had expressed disappointment at the number of Bengali Hindus, who constitute 18 per cent of Assam’s population and a majority of the party’s vote bank, being excluded. In the run-up to the final list exclusion worries had weighed heavily on people in the state’s lower districts, which are dominated by migrant Muslims.
In national elections held this year the BJP won nine of 14 seats in Assam, backed by votes from tribals, Assamese Hindus and Bengali Hindus. Speaking to a TV Channel , firebrand BJP MLA Silditya Dev alleged the NRC was part of a “conspiracy to keep Hindus out and help Muslims”. He alleged the NRC software was bugged and the process of preparing the citizen’s list was steeped in corruption.
Last month, after meeting with Mr Shah, Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal appeared to suggest the BJP could use the legislative (or ordinance) route to re-examine the final NRC.
Shah said the cultural relations of the Northeast with mainland India had existed since the days of Mahabharata.It was temporarily affected during ‘gulami’ period but now time has come to restore it and take it forward, Shah said without elaborating it.
He was addressing the 68th plenary session of North Eastern Council (NEC) here. “In Mahabharata, Babruvahan or Ghatotkach were from the Northeast. Arjun had married Chitrangada in Manipur, Sri Krishna’s grandson also got married in the Northeast.”
“Our aim is that by 2020, the eight states of the Northeastern region figure in the railway and air connectivity maps of the country”, he added. Shah said that the priority given to the Northeast by the BJP-led government in the last five years has transformed it from a place known for terrorism, border disputes, drugs, arms trafficking and corruption to an area witnessing rapid development and connectivity.
Asserting that no Congress prime ministers had attended NEC meetings, he said, besides Morarji Desai, it was PM Modi who attended a NEC meeting at Shillong in 2018 as he wanted to develop the region on par with the rest of the country.(With Agency Inputs ).
