Citizenship Bill will be passed soon: Modi

Silchar, Jan 4 (IANS) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said the Constitutional (Amendment) Bill, 2016, will be passed in Parliament soon even as he said that the government will make sure that no genuine Indian citizen is left out of the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

"Our government is going ahead with the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2016. This bill is related to emotion and lives of people. If there are people in the world who believes on Ma Bharati and they were persecuted from other countries, will Ma Bharati not give shelter to them?" asked Modi at a public rally at Ramnagar here.

"If the Indian origin people were ousted from other countries, where will they go?" he asked.

"I do not want to go into the details of the history of partition. People of the country had trusted those who had divided the country. There were mistakes in the past. This bill will be a penance against injustice done in past," said the Prime Minister, who also kickstarted the BJP's election campaign in Assam for next year's Lok Sabha polls.

"The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill was brought after long thought and hard labour," he said, adding that it was likely to be passed in Parliament soon.

The Prime Minister also assured the people in Assam's Barak Valley that no one's name will be excluded from the NRC. I am here to assure you that no Indian citizen's name will be left out of the NRC.

"I know that a lot of people had to suffer due to this process of updating the NRC. I am aware of this. But it is your sacrifice which has made the process successful. We had appealed to the Supreme Court to accept some documents like relief certificate, refugee camp certificate as valid for claiming one's citizenship. I am happy that the SC agreed to this," he added.

On Friday, the Prime Minister first visited Manipur to inaugurate several projects and lay the foundation stone of different projects.