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Country-wide NRC ‘needless’ and has ‘no justification’: Nitish
YB WEB DESK. Dated: 1/14/2020 12:08:09 PM
Patna, Jan 13 Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday said that a country-wide implementation of National Register of Citizens was “needless” and had “no justification”. Speaking in the state Legislative Assembly, Kumar further said that his government agreed in principle to National Population Register (NPR) as they did likewise when such an exercise was last conducted 10 years ago. He, however, emphasised that the census should be caste- based. The CM said he was ready to have a discussion in the House with regard to “extra details” being sought as part of the NPR. He made the remarks while thanking the House for its unanimous support to the Constitution amendment for extending quotas for SCs and STs in the two Houses of the Parliament by another 10 years at a special day-long session convened for the purpose. Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi was seated next to him when Kumar was speaking. The chief minister said at present he was preoccupied with the Jal Jeevan Hariyali drive on environmental conservation and all aspects relating to the issues could be discussed in the next session of the house and its sentiments conveyed to the Centre. Earlier, Leader of the Opposition Tejashwi Yadav, in his brief but impassioned statement, had remarked “the nation is on fire” on the issues of CAA, NRC and NPR and sought to know whether the chief minister “stands with Lalan Singh or Pavan Varma and Prashant Kishor”. Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh is the leader in Lok Sabha of the JD(U) headed by Kumar. The party had voted in favour of the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill in both houses of Parliament, to which Varma, a national general secretary, and Kishor the national vice president had taken strong exception. In his address, Kumar said “this session has been convened for a specific purpose. However, there is a lot of turmoil over CAA, NRC and NPR. I agree with the Leader of the Opposition that there should be a discussion on these.