While the country is witnessing several protests against NPR, the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC), Maharashtra will roll out data collection for National Population Register (NPR) from May 1.
The Maharashtra government is expected to issue a notification about the drive soon, Hindustan Times reported, citing officials within the ministry. As per a report by CNN-News18, chief minister Uddhav Thackeray is keen to implement NPR in Maharashtra from May 1, even though the NCP and Congress remain opposed to the exercise.
NCP leader Majeed Memom told CNN-News18, “It is clear that the party is not supporting NPR. [Chief] Sharad Pawar has made it clear. The ultimate decision has to be accepted by all three parties.”
On the other hand, Congress leader Sanjay Nirupam, on Friday, said that former Finance Minister P Chidambaram was telling JNU students to oppose the National Population Register (NPR) and in contrast Maharashtra's Sena-NCP-Congress government has announced the implementation of NPR from May 1 to June 15.
But this is not the first time allies have disagreed on issues. In his first criticism of Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray after their government in Maharashtra came to office in November, NCP supremo Sharad Pawar on Friday said the Shiv Sena chief was wrong in letting the NIA take over the probe into the Elgar Parishad case from the state police.
Pawar expressed his unhappiness on Thackeray's decision on a day when a Pune court passed an order to transfer the Elgar Parishad case to a special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in Mumbai. The court also said the order of investigation by the central agency cannot be said to be illegal or improper. Talking to reporters in Kolhapur, Pawar said it was not right on the part of the Centre to hand over the probe into the case, which was with the Pune police, to the NIA as law and order was a state subject.
(Inputs from Agencies)
