A day after Karnataka Police carried out a verification exercise of coffee estate workers in Kodagu, the government has sought a report from the police. The Department of Labour sought a report over alleged violation of labour rights.
It was reported recently that thousands of migrant workers working in coffee estates in Kodagu were called to the police station in order to conduct online and offline verification. This was done in accordance with orders received from Kodagu Superintendent of Police, Dr. Suman Pannekar. The workers were then taken to the processing centres Madikeri, Virajpet and Kushalnagar towns, where the verification process continued. The migrant workers who hailed mostly from Assam and West Bengal were asked to produce ID proofs like Aadhaar card, PAN card and voter IDs.
“Over 5,000 migrant workers were checked for identity proof. Among them, about 500 did not possess the required documents. The estate owners where these 500 workers are employed, have been asked to collect the original documents. They have also been instructed not to send back these unverified workers,” the SP Dr Suman D Pannekar said. She deined that this verification had anything to do with National Register of Citizens (NRC) or Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 (CAA). She said that government had not issued instructions in this regard and the verification was being done to control crime rate. She said that the exercise was ordered following speculation that terrorists may have taken refuge in coffee estates across Gonikoppal.
P. Manivannan, Secretary, Department of Labour, said he had sought a few clarifications as it pertained to workers and wished to know whether it was done last year as well and the reason behind it.
However, BJP MLA from Karnataka, KG Bopaiah said that the verification was done to identify Bangladeshi immigrants. “In recent times there has been a feeling that there are terrorists in Gonikoppal and they had a role in Mangalore riots,” he said. He further said, “In the entire district, how many people from Bangladesh or Assam are here we must find out? Are they really citizens of this country and do they have aadhaar? We should know this.”
The MLA’s version is completely contrary to the police version and hence this raises questions on the intention of this verification drive, which has not been authorised by the government. It however, seems like another furtive method of the government to begin implementation of CAA and lay the foundation for NRC in the near future.
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