Assam NRC coordinator Prateek Hajela, in his report to the Supreme Court, has said the certified copy of 1951 NRC issued by the Jamiat-Ulama-i-Hind has been “tampered with to include a name of a person who was originally not there”.
Hajela’s report to the apex court on October 4 said the Jamiat has issued a certified copy of the 1951 NRC with a name, which was not in the original NRC.
He had earlier submitted before the court to drop five of the 15 admissible documents, including the 1951 NRC, to be rejected for the claims and objection process currently under way.
The 1951 certified copy of the Jamiat has the names of Harunal Rashid, Jainab Nessa, Rabia Khatun, Rupbhanu Bibi, Apiran Bibi, Haasen Banu, Sonatan Nessa, Atru Mali, Jinnat Ali, Aimana Khatun and Manik Ali, who are said to be of the same family.
However, going through the original 1951 NRC copy, the authorities found the name of Manik Ali was not there.
Hajela’s report says Manik Ali’s name has “actually been tampered with (inserted mischievously)”. It says during the early 1960s, based upon the government’s instructions, copies of the 1951 NRC were officially made available to Jamiat and Congress parties to enable them provide its extracts to “(supposed)” genuine citizens with a view “apparently to save them the harassment” of getting the certified copies from the authorities.
The NRC authorities had discovered this through research as they were trying to set up a system for the update.
Hajela’s report says the Manik Ali incident, which was detected in 2014-15, is an “isolated case but such possibilities exist and in high numbers” and that this prompted the NRC authorities to subsequently develop the family tree system of verification.
Assam state Jamiat Ulama secretary Fazlul Karim Qasimi on Sunday said in the history of Jamiat there was “no instance of document tampering”.
Jamiat-Ulama-i-Hind is party to the NRC case being heard in the Supreme Court. The court had on October 23 directed that all who are party to the case be provided a copy of Hajela’s report.
Qasimi told The Telegraph that they will sit on Tuesday in Guwahati with legal experts. “We challenge Hajela to prove his allegations. Or we will take legal action,” he said.
Qasimi said names of many people who were in the 1951 NRC disappeared later on. “If asked, the administration talks about lack of data or says that termites have destroyed the documents,” he said.
“Besides, the NRC authorities have not accepted any documents other than issued by the government authority. In that case why has Jamiat’s name been dragged into it?” Qasimi asked.
Hajela’s report also says during family tree verification, instances have also been found of imposters trying to bribe or threaten the original users of the legacy data code to declare them family members before investigating officers.
It says there is a “limitation” to the family tree process as it can detect imposters only when there is a conflict in claims and original users do not succumb to bribery or threat.
The report says if all the parties are in hand in glove then it is difficult to ascertain fraudulent claims.
