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Sollu
Bewarse
Username: Sollu
Post Number: 1184
Registered: 03-2004
Posted From: 144.160.130.16
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 2:51 pm: |    |
ide mata eppatinuncho antunnaru adi ayyaevaraku wait seyyalsinde |
Ranga
Bewarse
Username: Ranga
Post Number: 1636
Registered: 03-2004
Posted From: 65.208.22.26
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 2:39 pm: | |
Overseas Indians to get dual citizenship
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh assured the expatriates that his government “is committed to making India attractive enough for them.”
MUMBAI, DHNS:
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday announced that all overseas Indians would be eligible for dual citizenship and exhorted the diaspora to invest in India and its future in a large way.
Delivering the inaugural address at the opening of the third Pravasi Bharatiya Diwas 2005 (PBD) here, Mr Singh said: “The government has decided to offer dual citizenship to all overseas Indians who migrated from the country after January 26, 1950, as long as their home countries allow dual citizenship under their law.”
Around 2,500 overseas Indians have arrived here for the three-day event, which is being held in the backdrop of the tsunami devastation in southern Indian coasts and the Andaman and Nicobar islands.
Surinam Vice-President Jules Rattankoemar Ajodhia was the chief guest at the opening ceremony.
Minister of State for Overseas Indians Affairs Jagdish Tytler welcomed the guests.
Under the dual citizenship, the Persons of Indian Origin (PIO) are granted the Indian citizenship and get all benefits, but they cannot vote in Indian elections.
In fact, the process of granting dual citizenship to Indian expatriates has already begun. Manju R Jehu, a resident of Australia, became the first PIO to be listed for dual citizenship on November 1, when the Indian Embassy in Australia registered her in the presence of Mr Tytler. Parliament amended the Citizenship Act for the purpose last year.
Mr Singh said the government had received several representations against the original approach of notifying some selected countries for dual citizenship.
Announcing extension of the facility to all overseas Indians, he said: “A day will come when every single overseas Indian who wishes to secure Indian citizenship will actually be able to do so.” He pledged himself to work in that direction.
Mr Singh said the “government will also simplify the application forms for citizenship for overseas Indians”. A new user-friendly form combining the three forms prescribed earlier had also been evolved and would be notified soon, he said.
Various options, including the possibility of issuing smart cards, were also being considered, he said.
“I hope the security, operational and other aspects of issuing this document will be completed soon without any further loss of time,” he added.
‘Have faith in India’
The prime minister urged overseas Indians to invest in India, in primary education, in infrastructure, in India’s future.
He assured them that the reform process started a decade back would be carried forward in the economic field and would even be extended to administration and the polity so that India’s vast latent potential was unchained.
“There is much that the expatriates can contribute through inspiration of your example and through investment in our future.”
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Ranga
Bewarse
Username: Ranga
Post Number: 1635
Registered: 03-2004
Posted From: 65.208.22.26
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 2:33 pm: | |
http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?conten t_id=62262&headline=NRIs~to~get~dual~citizenship
MUMBAI, JANUARY 7: A day before Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to the tsunami-ravaged islands of Andaman and Nicobar, he came to Mumbai with a promise to India’s diaspora—made with emotion and frankness—on a landmark new deal in dual citizenship.
Emphasising the idea of ‘‘Indianness’’ that binds the nation with its 25 million overseas Indians, Singh told NRIs from 61 nations at the third Pravasi Bharatiya Divas here that he understood the complex migrant psyche.
Appealing for massive investment in education and infrastructure, Singh said: ‘‘Your impatience at our bureaucratic ways is understandable.’’
The PM then announced the decision to ‘‘give substance to the long-standing demand of dual citizenship, without further loss of time. I am painfully aware it was promised earlier. I regret that little has happened.’’
The government will extend dual citizenship to all overseas Indians who migrated post January 26, 1950—provided it is permitted under laws of their home nations.
To take his ‘‘pledge’’ forward, Singh said the cumbersome application forms will be simplified with one user-friendly form to replace the three forms prescribed earlier.
The format of certificates of registration for overseas Indians will also be improved. ‘‘A smart card is being considered,’’ he said. Acknowledging that governments had taken too much time over the issue, he said he had directed concerned ministries to spell out benefits of such registration, for clarity of policy.
‘‘I hope the day will come when every single Indian who wishes dual citizenship will get it,’’ said Singh. The PM also called upon overseas Indian parents to send children to study in India. ‘‘The psyche of the migrant is complex,’’ he said, referring to the hard times his family faced during Partition. Emphasising that he and his daughters had benefited from education here, he appealed to NRIs to fund NGOs for primary education in villages of their forefathers.
Our airports are getting clogged, the PM admitted before highlighting reforms in civil aviation reforms, including the open skies policy. ‘‘We need massive investment in infrastructure, rural and urban, to step up rate of economic growth to 7-8 per cent a year,’’ said Singh.
With an assurance to extend reforms to polity and administration, he said never in human history have a billion people, mostly poor, built such a nation of promise.
The assurances were plenty, from plans to address the issue of protecting returns on the savings of Gulf NRIs to their work contracts. ‘‘We should try and wean away NRIs in the Gulf from bank deposits to debt or even equity-oriented savings,’’ said the Prime Minister.
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