A distinction has to be made between refugees and illegal immigrants, union minister Smriti Irani said here Tuesday, against the backdrop of controversies surrounding the NRC and the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill in Assam.
The draft National Register of Citizens (NRC) was published a few months back, in which about 40 lakh people were found to be lacking valid papers which could qualify them as being the citizens of India.
The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 was introduced in the Lok Sabha to amend the Citizenship Act, 1955 to grant Indian citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians who fled religious persecution in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan and entered India before December 31, 2014.
Both of these have been surrounded by controversies.
On Tuesday, 46 groups organised a 12-hour shutdown in Assam to protest against the Citizenship Bill.
"We have to make a distinction between refugees and illegal immigrants. That is where a lot of angst can be addressed," Irani, Minister of Textiles, said at the 'Young Thinkers' conference organised by the British High Commission and the Observer Research Foundation here.
"You have somebody who has been given a particular status because the government recognises their political, social compulsions to come over and seek refuge in your country," she said, apparently referring to the Citizenship Bill.
Apparently referring to illegal immigrants sought to be identified under NRC, the minister said, "when somebody infiltrates your border, comes in and gets into many schemes just by virtue of breaking the law, that is something that has to be looked into in a different context."
Disclaimer: No Business Standard Journalist was involved in creation of this content