In 2016, Pakistan received the least number of medical visas among India’s neighbours, according to the data given by the government in the Lok Sabha. The largest number of medical visas — 99,799 — was given to Bangladeshis, followed by 33955 to Afghanistan and 2315 to those from Sri Lanka. No data was given for China and Bhutan.
Pakistan accounted for 1678 medical visas. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has been active on the social media helping Pakistanis who need to come to India for medical treatment.
Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju informed the Lok Sabha that there was no proposal for introduction of new categories of visa at present.
The total number of medical visas stood at 201099. The other countries that received a significant number of such visas were Oman (12227), Uzbekistan (4420), Nigeria (4359), Maldives (3107) and Somalia (3079).
Foreigners in Assam
In a reply to a question in the Lok Sabha, Mr. Rijiju said that nearly 20,000 people had been declared foreigners by the Foreigners Tribunals (FTs) in Assam till October 2017 and were kept in detention centres. The question was raised by Assam MP Badruddin Ajmal, whose name did not figure in the “part draft” of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) that was released by the Registrar General of India on December 31 night. The NRC is being updated in Assam to identify Bangladeshis who entered India illegally after March 1971. Nearly 1.9 crore of the 3.29 crore applicants featured in the list.
Mr. Rijiju said issuing notice to the ‘D’ [doubtful/ disputed] voters is a legal process and there is no question of harassing people. ‘D’ voters are not detained. “Only persons declared by FTs as foreigners are kept in detention centres,” he said.
The Minister said according to the white paper on the foreigners issue, released by the Assam’s Home and Political Department, the letter ‘D’ was marked against the names of those electors who could not prove their Indian citizenship status at the time of verification. Based on the verification report, the Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) took a decision on whether a reference to the tribunal concerned was necessary to ascertain their Indian citizenship status.
“Based on the judgements/orders of the tribunals, the ‘D’ was either removed if Indian citizenship status was confirmed or the name of the elector is deleted from the rolls if citizenship status could not be established in court,” he said.
