File photo of Assam state National Register of Citizens (NRC) officials check documents of residents after the... Read More

NEW DELHI: A fortnight before publication of the final National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam , the Centre and state government on Tuesday moved the Supreme Court seeking re-verification of 20% of draft NRC data while claiming that exclusion of Indian citizens and inclusion of illegal Bangladeshi migrants in the draft had come to notice.

The SC has set July 31 as the deadline for publication of the final NRC.

The Centre and Assam government backed up their plea by recalling that the SC had itself in August last year favoured re-verification of 10% of the entries in the NRC. “We are of the view that the court should consider the necessity of carrying out sample re-verification of at least 10% of the names included in the final draft NRC, if required by a team of NRC Seva Kendra personnel from a neighbouring district,” the apex court had said on August 28 last year.

Citing this, solicitor general Tushar Mehta mentioned the applications before a bench headed by CJI Ranjan Gogoi and sought urgent hearing. The CJI said, “NRC state coordinator (Prateek Hajela) has also filed a report. But the deadline for publication of final NRC is July 31.” The SG said if the applications could be listed before the deadline, the government would explain the need for re-verification of draft NRC data and then abide by whatever the SC decided.

The two applications by the Centre and Assam made identical prayers, “Pass an order directing 20% sample re-verification of names included in the final draft NRC in the districts of Assam bordering Bangladesh and 10% sample re-verification of names included in the final draft NRC in the remaining districts. Pass appropriate directions thereby fixing the place for sample re-verification at a place not being in the vicinity of initial NRC verification so as to rule out possibility of local influences, bias, threat etc.”

According to the Assam government, many original inhabitants of the state found their names excluded as they lacked documents and did not even apply for inclusion in NRC. As against this, many of those detected and declared to be foreigners by tribunals had been included in the draft NRC. Not just that, many of those determined to be foreigners were working as NRC officers, the state government claimed.

It accused NRC officials of including foreigners in the register in exchange for bribes, and pointed out that while districts bordering Bangladesh had recorded a higher rate of inclusion, those dominated by original inhabitants had witnessed a higher rate of exclusion.

The final draft NRC, published in August last year, had excluded over 40 lakh people. The state NRC coordinator’s office has so far received 36.2 lakh applications for inclusion of names, and another 2 lakh applications seeking exclusion of names.

NGO ‘Assam Public Works’, on whose petition the SC started monitoring NRC work six years ago, has also filed an application seeking 100% re-verification of names included in the final draft in 22 districts of the state while highlighting the arrest of two NRC officials, who were seeking bribe from an applicant for inclusion in the final NRC.



In Video: Assam: Government extends NRC deadline by one month to July 30