Guwahati: The Assam government proposes to digitise the record of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and has also recommended increasing the number of Foreigners Tribunals in the state by nearly three-fold.
“From now on NRC records would be digitised. This will keep them safe and could also be useful for reference in future,” Assam government spokesperson and Industry and Commerce Minister Pradyut Bordoloi said here. He said the Centre has given its in-principle approval to the plan and asked the state to prepare a format. “The NRC records of 1951 are missing in many places as files have been lost as they were in paper. With digitisation this problem would be solved,” the minister said.
“Currently there are 36 Foreigners Tribunals in the state. We have recommended to the central government that the numbers be increased to 100. We want at least 3-4 tribunals in each district,” he added.
Accusing the All Assam Students’ Union and opposition parties like Asom Gana Parishad and the BJP of “playing politics” over the recently released White Paper on illegal immigrants, Bordoloi said that Congress regimes in Assam since 1947 have taken steps to solve the problem.
“We are also looking to form a three member special Commiserate to guide the government on the issue of updating the National Register of Citizens in place of existing Directorate. This shows our sincerity and commitment to detect and deport all illegal immigrants,” he said. Terming Assam’s history as one created by “immigration” of people of diverse ethnicity, Bordoloi said the issue of identifying and deporting aliens have to be carried out within the boundary of law and keeping in view humanitarian concerns.
“You just cannot pick anybody by his throat and chuck him out of the country… Besides, just because a person speaks a particular language and wears a particular attire does not mean he is a foreigner,” he said. Bordoloi added that Assam government has asked the Centre to take up the issue of having a bilateral pact with Bangladesh for repatriation of illegal immigrants.
“The AASU, AGP and BJP are calling the White Paper a white lie. I want to state that this is the first time in the history of Assam since 1947 that a state government has released such a report giving details of the foreigners’ issue, steps taken to address it and also an action plan for the future,” he said. The minister said that steps to check infiltration have shown result and this was evident from the decadal population growth in Assam growing by only 17.9 per cent between 2001 and 2011 as compared to 17.6 per cent for all India.
“In fact, it was during the NDA regime at the Centre that the office of the Commissioner for Borders’ office was removed from Assam… When AGP was in power, then Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta was unable even to state the number of illegal immigrants in the state,” Bordoloi said.
Regarding the controversial aspect of high growth rate of minority population, the minister said high birth rates are a result of lack of women’s empowerment and low female literacy and has nothing to do with religion.
Giving a historical perspective, he said the Gopinath Bordoloi led Congress government in 1947 brought an amendment to the Land and Revenue Act of Assam of 1886 to protect land rights of indigenous people in the state and the Congress regime deported 1.78 lakh immigrants to then East Pakistan between 1961 and 1966. (PTI)