GUWAHATI: Complying with the Supreme Court’s directive, the Centre has approved the inter-cadre deputation of Assam NRC coordinator Prateek Hajela to Madhya Pradesh for three years. The BJP government in the state had been reluctant to release Hajela, who has copped most of the blame for alleged flaws in the NRC exercise, till the Supreme Court and the Registrar General of India approved the updated citizenship rolls.

Sources said the department of personnel and training under the ministry of personnel, public grievances and pensions approved Hajela’s deputation on November 1, almost a fortnight after a bench of the apex court ordered his inter-cadre transfer for the “maximum period permissible”.

The court had asked the Centre to complete the formalities within seven days. A source in the state government said there were multiple reasons why Hajela should have been asked to stay back. “The NRC process is yet to be completed. The list has been published, but the next step is yet to start.

Reasons for exclusion have to be individually issued so that people can file appeals in tribunals. The NRC document itself has not been approved either by the Supreme Court or the registrar general.” Hajela’s successor will be decided by the registrar general.

“The state government has no role to play in this matter,” the source said. Hajela, a 1995-batch IAS officer from the Assam-Meghalaya cadre, was appointed the NRC coordinator in 2013, when the state had a Congress government.

After BJP came to power in 2016 on the back of a promise to complete the NRC, things went downhill for Hajela. His rift with the BJPled state government and the party grew after the draft NRC was published in July 2018.

