New Delhi: The Central government has been preparing for the National Population Register (NPR) amid the ongoing protests over the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC). The Union Cabinet is likely to consider a proposal on Tuesday to allocate funds for updating the National Population Register, an exercise which is to commence from April next year, sources have said. The proposal is part of the agenda of the cabinet meeting that is going to take place today at 10.30 am, sources said. With this cabinet meeting, there is a strong possibility that after the CAA move, the Centre may now focus on NPR renewal.

The NPR is a list of “usual residents” of the country. A “usual resident” is defined for the purposes of NPR as a person who has resided in a local area for the past six months or more or a person who intends to reside in that area for the next six months or more. The data for National Population Register was collected in 2010 along with the houselisting phase of Census of India 2011.

Under the NPR, a census will be conducted from house to house across the country from April 1, 2020 to September 30, 2020. Its aim is to create a database of comprehensive identity of common residents of the country. This data will also contain biometric information along with demographics.

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A gazette notification to this effect was issued in August this year.

“In pursuance of sub-rule(4) of rule 3 of the Citizenship (Registration of Citizens and Issue of National Identity Cards) Rules, 2003, the central government hereby decides to prepare and update the Population Register….and the field work for house to house enumeration throughout the country except Assam for collection of information relating to all persons who are usually residing within the jurisdiction of Local Registrar shall be undertaken between the 1st day of April, 2020 to 30th September, 2020,” said the notification.

The NPR initiative started in 2010 under the Manmohan Singh government. Any resident residing in any area in the country for six months or more is required to register with the NPR.

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The NPR will be prepared at the local (village/sub-Town), sub-district, district, state and national level under provisions of the Citizenship Act 1955 and the Citizenship (Registration of Citizens and issue of National Identity Cards) Rules, 2003. It is mandatory for every usual resident of India to register in the NPR. The objective of the NPR is to create a comprehensive identity database of every usual resident in the country. The database would contain demographic as well as biometric particulars.

(With inputs from agencies)