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have proper birth records of pre-Liberation era.

“I have spoken to the Chief Minister to ask the ministry of external affair for special concession to revert its decision on routing consulate’’s document verification process through sub-registrar and not the MEA,” he said.

He said that it has been observed that people applying for Portuguese nationality are looked upon as antinational. This perception should be removed. There is no reason to talk about it or claim that their decision is against the nation.

Admitting that the state has failed to provide better facilities which has encouraged some people to go for a Portuguese passport, Sardesai said that if a person feels that he has better prospects somewhere else then it is his or her democratic right to decide on which way he or she should go so as to come up in life.

Responding to a question on chief town planner Dr S T Puttaraju vis-à-vis the creation of three divisions in the T&CP department, Sardesai said, “It was unanimously decided in the assembly to have two chief town planners… I don’’t understand why there is hue and cry over this. He (Puttaraju) is just a bureaucrat and every bureaucrat is either shunted or made popular…”