BJP lawmaker Tejasvi Surya in Lok Sabha demanded that the Central government should extend the National Register of Citizens (NRC) to Karnataka also, saying more than 40,000 “illegal Bangladeshi Muslim immigrants” are there and posing “a threat” to the security of the State.

Raising the issue during Zero Hour, the Bangalore South MP the illegal Bangladeshi immigrants have become “a very serious economic threat” to the people of Karnataka, “especially the locals”, as they have taken up jobs after “illegally' procuring Aadhaar cards, voter ID cards and other documents “through the help of the State government and the authorities.”

They have also been “trying to change” the demography of Karnataka, he added.

Surya also pressed for extension of the NRC to all the States to “weed out” illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, saying they have started taking refuge in other parts of the country since the process for updating the NRC register began in Assam.

“A very senior officer of a private company Ola was arrested by the CCB (Central Crime Branch) people and it came to light that even that man was an illegal Bangladeshi immigrant. Just yesterday, a terror module, which operates from Bangladesh, was busted in Bangalore and the details that have come out with the investigation are very scary. They point to these illegal immigrants plotting terror attacks in different parts of the country. They are security threat,” Surya told Lok Sabha.

When the BJP leader was raising the issue during Zero Hour, the House was witnessing an uproar over political crisis in Karnataka with the Congress members being up on fit protesting and accusing the BJP of “conspiring to topple” the JD(S)-Congress government in the State.

Calling the illegal migrants “a serious economic threat” to the people of Karnataka amid din, the Surya said they were taking away jobs from the locals, whether it is the job of drivers for cabs, work in hotels or jobs with “garbage collection mafias” in the State.

In Chikkamagaluru, “many plantation workers” are from Bangladesh, he said.

“They have come here illegally and trying to procure voter ID Aadhaar card through the local agencies and this will prove a very important security threat. Therefore I request the central government and to kindly extend the NRC to Karnataka, as well as Bangalore and in fact all over the country,” he said.

A sovereign State “must” protect the integrity of its border and the interest of all of its citizens “by sending out and deporting illegal immigrants,” he demanded.