NPR has nothing to do with NRC, Prakash Javadekar clarifies after cabinet meet

The Narendra Modi cabinet today decided that the National Population Register (NPR) will be updated along with the house-listing phase of Census 2021 from April to September 2020 in all the states/union territories, except Assam. The cabinet has also sanctioned funds to the tune of over ₹8,500 crore for updating NPR.

The Cabinet has also approved restructuring of the Railway Board by downsizing its strength from eight to five including the chairperson, and merging its different cadres into a single Railway Management System. Indian Railways will now have only one cadre -- Indian Railway Service, instead of current eight services for various departments including Engineering, Traffic, Mechanical and Electrical.

Cabinet briefing by Union Ministers Prakash Javadekar and Piyush Goyal:

Restructured Railway Board will end departmentalism, no seniority will be compromised: Minister Piyush Goyal-Railway board will no longer be organised on departmental lines, and replaced with leaner structure organised on functional lines. The board will be headed by Chairman Railway Board (CRB) who will be the CEO with 4 members and some independent members: Piyush Goyal.

-Cabinet approves organisational restructuring of Indian Railways. Existing eight Group A services of the Railways will be reorganised into a Central Service called Indian Railway Management Service (IRMS)

-NPR is a population registrar and not a citizens' registrar: Javadekar.

-NPR has nothing to do with NRC: Javadekar.

-NPR was done by the UPA in 2010 also and we are repeating it in 2020.

-Funds to the tune of ₹627.40 crore have been approved for 10 projects sanctioned during 2018-19 in Swadesh Darshan Scheme. Additional ₹1854.67 crore during 2019-20 for sanctioning of new projects.

-The Cabinet has approved the creation of a chief of defence staff (CDS), who will be the single-point military adviser to the government.

-Cabinet has also approved promulgation of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (Amendment) Ordinance, 2019.

-Cabinet has approved expenditure of ₹8,754.23 crore for the exercise of Census of India 2021 and ₹3,941.35 crore for updation of National Population Register (NPR).

-Cabinet has approved the conducting of Census of India 2021 and updating of National Population Register. It is self-declaration, no document, bio-metric, etc required for it.

-NPR data will be used for identifying the beneficiaries of subsidies.

-Census will be done using app. "No proof will be required during the census as it will be based on self-declaration," Javadekar said.

-The cabinet has approved ₹4,000 crore for Atal tunnel which is under construction from Manali to Leh. Javadekar said work is 80% complete now.

-Cabinet has approved Atal Bhujal Yojana (ATAL JAL) with total outlay of ₹6000 crore to be implemented over a period of 5 years in identified areas in Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.

-The Cabinet has approved the Atal Bhujal Yojana, a ₹6,000 crore scheme for sustainable management of ground water resources.