The Prabajan Virodhi Manch, a forum fighting influx, on Monday pointed out a lacuna that is purportedly preventing people from filing objections against “doubtful” voters and “foreigners” who names have entered the final draft of the updated National Register of Citizens (NRC).

The 1951 NRC is being updated only in Assam, under the supervision of the Supreme Court, to solve the problem of “foreigners”.

Manch convener Upamanyu Hazarika said, “It is public knowledge that thousands of declared foreigners, through the judicial process and D-voters have been included in the final draft NRC list. Objections should have been filed against them, which would be cases excluded without any investigation. But even this has not happened. The sole reason is that the 21-digit Acquirer Received Number (ARN) of every applicant, against whom the objection is to be filed, has to be compulsorily quoted. This ARN number, however, is not publicly available and even the NRC seva kendras are loathe to disclose such information. The procedure for filing objections has rendered the entire process a nullity.”

The NRC claims and objections period opened on September 25 and will close on December 15. The number of applicants who were excluded from the final draft NRC and are now filing claims for inclusion has also shown a huge shortfall. While 5,11,254 out of the 40,07,707 excluded from the final draft have filed for inclusion, the number of objections is only 194.

Hazarika said, “The number of claims and objections have thrown up a worrying trend. I submitted a representation to the registrar-general and the state co-ordinator of NRC today (Monday). According to publicly available figures, 5,11,254 or 12.5 per cent applicants (out of the 40.07 lakh names excluded from the final draft NRC, out of the 3.29 crore applicants) have re-submitted claims for inclusion. It is necessary to investigate the reasons for such a low percentage of submission. Filing objections against 194 applicants is miniscule. To give it a perspective, the figure of 40.07 lakh released is far short of the official estimates of illegal foreigners over the last few decades.”

He said former Assam chief minister late Hiteswar Saikia had given a figure of 32 lakh illegal migrants in Assam in 1992. Then Union minister of state for home Sriprakash Jaiswal quoted a figure of 50 lakh in 2001 and Union minister of state for home Kiren Rijiju gave the figure as 80 lakh in 2016. “Such a shortfall in exclusion should have been objected to,” he said.

He demanded that the government undertake re-verification of NRC applicants, especially in the border and minority-dominated districts.