Owaisi Appeals to Telangana CM to Stay NPR Work

Hyderabad: AIMIM President Asaduddin Owaisi on Tuesday appealed to Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao to stay work on National Population Register (NPR) as done by the Kerala government.

Addressing a meeting at Mahabubnagar on Tuesday night to protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC), he hoped that the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) government will not allow NPR, which is scheduled to begin in April next year.

"With folded hands I am appealing to the Chief Minister to stop NPR which is not good for the country," he said, hours after the Union Cabinet gave its approval for NPR.

All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief lauded TRS for opposing Citizenship Amendment Bill in the Parliament.

"The Chief Minister told me he will not do politics on Hindu-Muslim," said Owaisi, who along with leaders of United Muslim Action Committee addressed the meeting.

The Hyderabad MP is likely to lead a delegation of Action Committee to meet Chandrashekhar Rao on Wednesday to request him to stay NPR and oppose proposed NRC.

Owaisi slammed both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah for hiding truth relating to NRC, NPR and detention centres.

"CAA, NPR and NRC are all interlinked. What they (Modi and Shah) are saying is untrue," he said.

The MP even played an audio of Amit Shah's statement in Lok Sabha that NRC will definitely be carried out across the country as it was part of BJP's election manifesto.

Owaisi said the same was said in the Presidential address to both houses of Parliament and Modi himself stated it an interview to a television channel.

He also disputed their claim on detention centres. He recalled that then Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had stated that a detention centre was being built in Navi Mumbai.

"A detention centre is being built in Karanataka while in Assam a detention centre of the size of seven football fields is being constructed," he said.

Owaisi quoted from the website of Union Ministry of Home Affairs to say that NPR is the first step towards creation of NRC.

"Then Minister of State for Home Kiren Rejiju had also told Parliament on November 26, 2014 that NPR is the first step towards NRC," he said.

Explaining the link between NPR and NRC, Owaisi said under NPR even a low-rank official could write a remark that the information provided by a household is doubtful and depending on this such names will be deleted from NRC.

He claimed that CAA is aimed at ensuring that all the non-Muslims missing from NRC are granted citizenship. He referred to the state by Assam's Finance Minister that 5.4 lakh Bengali Hindus, who were missing from NRC, would get citizenship under CAA.

He said it was unfortunate that Modi did not say anything about 18 people killed in Uttar Pradesh, two in Karnataka and the police excesses on students of Jamia Millia Islamia and Aligarh Muslim University.

Owaisi alleged that innocent people were killed in the excesses committee by police in Uttar Pradesh. He demanded independent judicial probe into the killings.