Home Minister Khum Bahadur Khadka told both the houses of parliament Monday citizenship certificates of genuine Nepali citizens whose certificates were stripped after a recent Supreme Court ruling will be restored within one month of termination.

“A recent decision of the Supreme Court that annulled the decision of teams to award citizenship certificates has been made public. Nepali citizenship will be awarded to those Nepali citizens after completing due formalities within one month after receiving termination notices,” Khadka said.

The Supreme Court cancelled the naturalized citizenship of nearly 34,000 persons 12 days ago awarded by special teams deputed by the UML government of which Bam Deb Gautam was Home Minister several years ago on grounds that only the government had the privilege to award such citizenship certificates.

Naturalized citizenship is not an automatic right of an applicant; but the government has the discretion to award it to an applicant. But the court in the same ruling validated about 4,000 certificates issued by the chief district officers in 20 districts.

The Home Minister ordered the freeze of property of such non citizens after the Supreme Court verdict. Only descendants of male Nepali parents are entitled citizenship be descent. “Nepali citizens should get citizenship certificates without

hassles and the government is also equally aware that non nationals should not get citizenship certificates,” Khadka told both houses of parliament in a statement of public importance.

Khadka’s statement coincides with the boycotting of the parliament by the Nepal Sadbavana party which has been pressing for citizenship certificates for terai residents. The Khadka statement will initiate a new round of controversy on the

sensitive citizenship issue for terai residents.

The Supreme Court and late King Birendra turned down a legislation enacted by parliament last year to relax stiff rules to acquire citizenship. Khadka went at length to explain how successive Nepali Congress governments have tried to resolve the issue.