19 lakh left out of National Register of Citizens .....Legal battle ahead for those excluded

A woman on her way to check her name in the final National Register of Citizens in Morigaon, Assam, on Saturday. AP

TT, 1.09.19, Guwahati: Over 19 lakh people in Assam were left virtually stateless on Saturday, when the final National Register of Citizens was published, bringing to a close a four-year effort aimed at identifying illegal immigrants.

The final NRC was published on Saturday morning in two parts — the supplementary list of inclusion containing the names of applicants who were declared ineligible for inclusion in last year’s complete draft NRC but were later found eligible; and the exclusion list, containing the names of people found ineligible for inclusion. The number of those excluded stands at 19,06,657.

The Union home ministry has said non-inclusion in the final NRC does not by itself amount to an individual being declared a foreigner, and added that it is a decision that only foreigners tribunals are empowered to take.

The 19 lakh people excluded now face a legal battle to establish their citizenship in the foreigners tribunals, whose number in the state will be raised to 300 in October from 100 now. They have 120 days to appeal.

Among those left out are Kargil war veteran and President’s Medal winner Mohammad Sanaullah and sitting Silchar MLA Dilip Paul. Among those included is Paresh Barua, leader of the banned Ulfa (I).

Several organisations that were pushing for the NRC have been left unhappy.

The All Assam Students’ Union and the Assam Public Works said they had expected more exclusions. They have decided to move the Supreme Court, which has been monitoring the NRC.

The BJP said it was “very unhappy” as many genuine applicants, including those from other parts of the country who live in Assam, were left out. It put the figure of “indigenous people” left out at “not less than two lakh”. The party is believed to be worried about the exclusion of Bengali Hindus. At the same time, it was disappointed that the total exclusions were not higher.

The draft NRC, published in July, had excluded 40 lakh.

The final NRC has the names of 3,11,21,004 people out of the 3,30,27,661 applicants. The applications began to be collected in 2015.

NRC Assam state coordinator Prateek Hajela said in a statement: “The exercise of NRC update is a mammoth exercise involving around 52,000 state government officials…. All decisions of inclusion and exclusion are taken by these statutory officers.

“The entire process of NRC update has been meticulously carried out in an objective and transparent manner… as per statutory provisions….”

Rights bodies have criticised the exercise because it has left a large number of people “stateless”.

(Source & Courtesy: https://www.telegraphindia.com/india?ref=navbar_story-page )