Former Assam CM Tarun Gogoi unsure of NRC draft accuracy

Following a Supreme Court order, these names will not be included in the final draft, which will be published by July 30, a new deadline set by the  top court. 

The first draft of NRC was published on December 31 midnight last by including names of 1.90 crore people out of the total 3.29 crore applicants of Assam, recognising them as legal citizens of India.

However, Gogoi said that inclusion of the foreigners in the first draft of NRC published on December 31, 2017 will create a suspicion in the mind of everybody.

“How such a big number of illegal foreigners were included in the first draft. Who are the officers, who neglected their duties,” Gogoi said.

NRC State coordinator Prateek Hajela informed the Supreme Court that, during the course of the Family Tree investigation, 65,694 cases which were earlier found to be matched at office level were discovered to be false. Due opportunity has been given to such persons during the Family Tree hearing and as such their names are proposed for exclusion from Complete Draft NRC as per the provisions of Clause 4(3), 4(5) & 4(6) of the Citizenship Rules, 2003.

“Similarly, 48,456 cases of married women who have submitted Panchayat certificates as a linkage document but were included in the Part Draft based on their office verification have not been found admissible in the verification process of hearing conducted for Gaon Panchayat Secretary Certificate verification as mandated by the Hon'ble Court," he said.

"These married women appeared subsequent to their inclusion in the Part Draft for special verification conducted in respect of Gaon Panchayat Secretary Certificates. As such, 1.15 lakh persons already included in Part Draft have not been found admissible for inclusion during the verification process in the Complete Draft though were part of the Part Draft. In addition to these persons, the quality control exercise has also revealed errors in respect of 19,783 persons who were included in the Part Draft but are not eligible,” the NRC state coordinator informed the Supreme Court.

“As such about 1.5 lakh persons will be excluded from Complete Draft NRC although they were included in the Part Draft and they will be individually informed about the decision and can file a claim for inclusion at the claim/objection stage. Those applicants will be informed additionally through a Letter of Information (LOI). The LOI will have to be served to the rejected applicants within 7 days from publication of Complete Draft. The LOI will explicitly state that the applicant has the opportunity to file Claim for inclusion. The LOI will also inform about the time schedule and place of submission of the Claim. The Hon’ble Court may like to grant approval to exclude such 1.5 lakh persons from Complete Draft NRC though their names appeared in Part Draft,” Hajela submitted to the apex court.

The apex court has approved the proposals submitted by the NRC state coordinator.

(Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath)