NEW DELHI: The ministry of home affairs (MHA) has directed the state governments of Manipur and Mizoram to ensure that biometric details of “illegal migrants” be recorded.

The central government has set end of September this year as deadline for the state governments of Manipur and Mizoram to complete the process.

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“…a campaign for capturing of biometric data of illegal migrants in the states of Manipur and Mizoram is to be completed by the end of September 2023,” a letter from the MHA stated.

It added: “The state governments of Manipur and Mizoram are requested to quickly prepare a plan and initiate the biometric capture of the illegal migrants.”

This letter was written by the MHA and shot off to the state governments of Manipur and Mizoram on June 22.

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Reacting to this development, Manipur BJP MLA Rajkumar Imo Singh stated that the “GOI has undertaken the task to identify illegal migrants across Manipur and Mizoram by capturing biometric data”.

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He said that the Manipur government “had already started this earlier this year due to which nearly 2500 illegal migrants were identified”.

“All districts have to arrange this up to the police station level as per the standardised format of NCRB,” Manipur BJP MLA Rajkumar Imo Singh said.

He added: “Looks like this is a step towards NRC.”

It may be mentioned here that by June 22, the time the letter from the central government was dispatched to the state governments of Manipur and Mizoram, thousands of people in Manipur were displaced in the ethnic violence that wreaked mayhem since May 3.

According to the MHA’s June 22 letter, a notification was issued by the ministry to the Manipur and Mizoram governments on March 2021 that stated specific instructions and guidelines on “overstay and illegal migration of foreign nationals”.

Notably, Manipur chief minister N Biren Singh, recently, blamed “illegal migrants” for the large-scale violence and mayhem in the state.