Step 1: Understand impurity defect.
When an ionic solid contains an impurity having a different valency than the host ion, defects are produced to maintain electrical neutrality.
Step 2: Analyze the impurity added to NaCl.
In NaCl crystal, sodium ion is \(\mathrm{Na^+}\).
The impurity added is \(\mathrm{SrCl_2}\), which provides \(\mathrm{Sr^{2+}}\) ions.
Since \(\mathrm{Sr^{2+}}\) replaces \(\mathrm{Na^+}\) in the crystal lattice, an extra positive charge is introduced.
Step 3: Maintain electrical neutrality.
To balance the extra positive charge produced by \(\mathrm{Sr^{2+}}\), one nearby \(\mathrm{Na^+}\) ion site remains vacant.
Thus, vacancies are created at cation positions.