Ahead Of Punjab Polls, Government Removes Names Of 225 Sikhs From Blacklist

New Delhi: Names of 225 Sikhs, chronicled in the government's blacklist for their alleged involvement in subversive or anti-India activities, have been removed over the last four years.

The pruning has been done in a list of 298 Sikhs which was prepared at different levels by security agencies since 1980s.

Those Indian-origin people, who were allegedly involved in subversive or anti-India activities abroad, were included in the blacklist and such people were barred from visiting India.

"We have pruned the list in the last four years and recently removed names of 36 Sikhs settled abroad," a Home Ministry official said.

The names of remaining 73 people, whose names are in the blacklist, are expected to be removed in phases, the official said.

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal had urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi after he assumed office in 2014 to direct the Home Ministry to evolve a mechanism for a regular review of all such cases.

Mr Badal had said he wanted removal of the names of persons from the list against whom no cases or legal proceedings were pending.

Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal too had written a letter to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh to review the blacklist of Sikhs and delete names of the persons who were not wanted in any criminal case in the state.

A delegation of British Sikhs too had urged the Prime Minister to remove the names of Sikh individuals from the list.

During the 1980s and 1990s, a large number of Sikh families had migrated to the US, Canada, the UK, Germany and other countries seeking political asylum.

Many of the asylum-seekers were booked in cases in India and have not been allowed to visit India in the past decades.