Out of the total 1,14,971 cases sent from Assam to West Bengal, only 7,438 responses or confirmations have been received (Photo: Vikram Sharma)

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is furious that names of nearly 40 lakh residents of Assam are missing from the National Register of Citizens (NRC). But her administration may be responsible for over a lakh of them not being in the list in the first place. While she has launched a movement of sorts against the NRC even before the process is complete, NRC officials say West Bengal officials responded to only a few queries sent to Bengal.

Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India Sailesh told news agency PTI that West Bengal is the biggest defaulter in NRC verification process when it comes to people who come from a different state but reside in Assam due to various reasons.

Sailesh, who oversaw the entire exercise of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), said that he had deputed his own staff to help the West Bengal government in collecting the documents sought by the NRC authorities but the efforts were not fruitful.

"The largest number of documents that we have not received among all states was from West Bengal. We had to struggle. We had to follow up. But we have not received substantial number of documents from West Bengal. The response (of West Bengal) in terms of results was not satisfactory," he said.

Meanwhile, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is going all out to fight for the rights of the 40 lakh people left out of the final draft of the Assam NRC.

According to the documents submitted to the Supreme Court by the NRC coordinator Prateek Hajela and his team, the number of pending cases from West Bengal is the highest as compared to other states.

Out of the total 1,14,971 cases sent from Assam to West Bengal, only 7,438 responses or confirmations have been received and the rest 1,07,541 are still pending.

The return percentage is only 6.46 per cent.

Though, this is not directly affecting the process it is definitely delaying the certification of lakhs of people, mainly women who have married in Assam but were born in West Bengal.

Senior officials of the West Bengal government have not responded to the reporter's queries on the issue till now.

Around 40 lakh people were left out from the final draft of the Assam NRC which was published on July 30. The authorities said that people whose names have been left out can appeal/object before September 28. Tribunals have also been set up to help the people seek legal help.

(With inputs from PTI)

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