ARTICLES

Article 01
Article 02
Article 03
Article 04
Article 05
Article 06
Article 07
Article 08
Article 09
Article10
Article 11
Article 12
Article 13

The Indian government is planning to restrict the movement of Pakistani nationals visiting the country to three places from 12 at present.

Expressing concern over increasing cases of Pakistani nationals overstaying or going underground in India, Minister of State for Home Vidyasagar Rao said the state governments have been empowered by the Centre to identify, nab and deport those Pakistani nationals who were staying in the country beyond the time permitted in their visas or had gone missing.

He said the steps were being taken in a bid to prevent Pakistani nationals from taking part in anti-India activities. "The government is also considering proposals to take undertakings from local sponsors who invite them," he added.

Rao, however, said the government is also contemplating granting citizenship on humanitarian grounds to aged Pakistanis who had their relatives here or those women who got married to Indian nationals.

Similarly, there are cases of aged persons who had crossed over from Pakistan during 1965 and 1971 wars and remained here since then, especially in Rajasthan and Gujarat, for whom grant of citizenship was being considered, he said. There are 4978 such persons, mostly Hindus, in Rajasthan, he added.

Rao said of the 11,208 cases of Pakistani nationals who entered India legally, as many as 2,324 persons among them had gone missing without trace. "You need only one Osama bin Laden to cause a disaster," he said. Registration of foreigners at all entry and exit points would also be computerized, he added.

Disclosing that several meetings were held in the home ministry to review the situation, he said these steps were being considered as it was found on random verification that 90 per cent of addresses given by Pakistani nationals for visa purposes in India were found to be false.

Following the Simla Agreement, India and Pakistan had signed an accord on issuance of passports, which entitled nationals of both countries to visit a maximum of three places.

The accord also restricted the issuance of visas only for meeting relatives or for diplomatic purposes. But New Delhi had unilaterally increased the number of places, which could be visited to 12 and also started issuing tourist visas, Rao said.

The proposal now was to restrict the places that could be visited by a Pakistani to three as before, he said, adding that stoppage of granting extension on tourist visas was also being considered.

He said "all unilateral concessions" granted by India were being reviewed and steps being taken to restrict many of them.

He said the practice of "100 per cent pre-verification" of those Pakistanis seeking Indian visas would be continued and added that official circulars had been issued to state governments concerned to verify the antecedents of their local sponsors also.

Asked whether any amendment in the Foreigners Act, 1946, or the Indian Passports Act, 1920, was required, Rao said only government orders would suffice in this regard.