Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday said that the National Population Register (NPR) will not affect the nationality status of any citizen of the country.
"NPR will not affect anyone's nationality. Even if somebody's name is missing from NPR, then too his citizenship will not be threatened," Shah said in an exclusive interview with 's Editor Smita Prakash.
Shah asserted that NPR was a continuation of a move started by the former UPA government.
"It is a constitutional provision and is the same exercise which was conducted by the Congress-led government earlier. It is neither a part of our mfesto nor our promise. It was a good move started by the Congress which is simply being followed," he said.
Shah's remarks came on a day the Union Cabinet approved the proposal for conducting Census of India 2021 and updation of National Population Register.
He assured that no person should have any reason to be concerned about the exercise and data collected under NPR exercise is helpful for the government to formulate schemes for people.
"The data collected under NPR will be used to formulate plans for the betterment of the public through central government schemes. It is not an exercise to decide citizenship of any person," Shah said.
( With inputs from ANI )