BJP chief sets 2024 deadline for the NRC
Says all ‘infiltrators’ to be expelled from India by then
BJP President and Indian Home Minister Amit Shah yesterday set a 2024 deadline for implementing the controversial National Register of Citizens across India and said “each and every” infiltrator will be identified and expelled before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Notwithstanding the admission by some BJP leaders in West Bengal that apprehensions over the NRC had cost the party dearly in last week’s bypolls there, Shah told assembly election meetings in Jharkhand that the nation-wide registration of citizens will be conducted despite reservations voiced by opposition parties, reports our correspondent in New Delhi.
“Today, I want to tell you that before the 2024 polls the NRC will be conducted across the country and each and every infiltrator identified and expelled,” he said.
“Rahul Baba [Congress leader Rahul Gandhi] says don’t expel them. Where will they go, what will they eat? But I assure you that before the country goes to polls in 2024, all illegal immigrants will be thrown out,” he told election rallies in Chakradharpur and Baharagora.
Shah said uprooting terrorism, naxalism and construction of a grand Ram temple in Ayodhya were as important in the Jharkhand election as local matters like development, reports The Times of India.
Raking up the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri mosque dispute once again, the BJP president alleged the Congress made attempts to thwart the hearing of the case in the Supreme Court.
“Congress leaders would tell the Supreme Court that there is no need for hearing the Ram Janmabhoomi case. With your backing, we submitted that it be taken forward, and the result is that the apex court has ruled that only a Ram temple will be built in Ayodhya,” he said.