In the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections, Shah had raised the pitch in West Bengal, where the BJP sought to use the “illegal immigrant” issue as a major poll plank to consolidate the Hindu votes against the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC government in the state.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Sunday that there has been no discussion on a National Register of Citizens (NRC) since the time his government was first elected in 2014, senior ministers and party leaders, including Home Minister and BJP president Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and BJP working president J P Nadda, have made public statements about a pan-India exercise — as recently as earlier this month.
The BJP’s manifesto for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections also promised NRC in “other parts of the country in a phased manner”. Under the headline, ‘Combating Infiltration’, the manifesto said the party would complete the process of NRC in areas where illegal migration has affected people’s livelihood and employment. “In future, we will implement NRC in a phased manner in other parts of the country,” it said.
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