Unhappy with the NRC exclusion figures, the AASU, APW and AAMSU, all parties in the National Register of Citizens (NRC) case in the apex court, have decided to move the Supreme Court for remedial measures.
“The exclusion of 19 lakh people from the final NRC is nowhere near the number declared by the Centre and the state government at various points of time. We are not running after the figures but we had expected more exclusions. We feel there is some error in the list and it is not complete,” All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) chief adviser Samujjal Bhattacharjya said after the publication of the final NRC here on Saturday.
A total of 19,06,657 or 19.06 lakh residents of Assam have not made it to the NRC. In all, 3,11,21,004 or 3.11 crore people have been included, out of 3,30,27,661 applicants.
“The NRC is updated through a legal process monitored by the Supreme Court. We will file an appeal before the Supreme Court for immediate measures. We have full confidence in the apex court, which will provide a solution to us,” Bhattacharjya added.
An AASU source said they had expected over 30 lakh people to be excluded. AASU members were seen sitting at Swahid Nyas on Saturday whereas at the time of publication of the final draft last year, they were seen celebrating and greeting each other there.
AASU had led the six-year-long anti-foreigner movement in the state, resulting in the 1985 Assam Accord and the NRC update.
The All Assam Minorities Students’ Union (AAMSU) and the Assam Public Works (APW) also said they would move the apex court, seeking its intervention to ensure an infiltrator-free NRC.
AAMSU adviser Azizur Rahman said, “We are unhappy at genuine citizens, irrespective of religion, being excluded. The numbers don’t matter as the figures provided by different people over time were speculative. Some said there are 40 lakh foreigners while others pegged the number at 80 lakh. The NRC was updated on a scientific basis, with many hearings and re-verifications. Many have been left out on technical grounds. We will approach the Supreme Court on their behalf.”
He said the NRC was not updated for the purpose of determining foreigners but for the inclusion of all genuine citizens living in the state prior to March 25, 1971.
He said people from the religious minorities have been feeling threatened and urged everyone to remain calm and refrain from passing inflammatory comments.
The APW, the original petitioner in the Supreme Court which led to the update of 1951 NRC, also expressed displeasure over the final NRC. It said it would move the apex court, seeking complete re-verification of the NRC applicants to weed out illegal migrants, and send memoranda to the Prime Minister and the President, seeking audit of the Rs 1,600-crore spent during the exercise.
“As primary petitioner, we approached the Supreme Court with five different memoranda, requesting re-verification of the draft NRC. But our request was not treated the way it should have been by the apex court. Mystery still surrounds the 27 per cent re-verification done by Prateek Hajela on his own without anyone’s knowledge. No one knows whether it was 100 per cent flawless or was there any discrepancy,” APW president Aabhijeet Sharma said.
He also alleged that the software used by the NRC officials during the exercise was flawed.
“We have come to know that the software used during the exercise cannot detect discrepancies relating to legacy data. Even if a single legacy data is used by multiple families, the software will continue to approve it. Hajela himself said this. We want to know if the software was examined by any third party IT expert. Was it due to the flaws of the unchecked software that the names of family members of 39 declared foreigner families were included in the draft NRC in Morigaon district, as mentioned by the Morigaon district commissioner?” Sharma asked.
Additional reporting by Abinash Kalita, Ali Fauz Hassan and Hiranya Barman
