GUWAHATI: The State Coordinator, Protik Hajela will submit the progress report on the on-going process of updating of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), 1951 in Assam to the Supreme Court on October 26 next.
The NRC is being updated under the supervision of the Supreme Court . The dopcument is being updated as per the agreement reached among Government of India, Government of Assam and All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) on May 5, 2005.
It is expected that an updated NRC will make detection of illegal migrants who had sneaked into the state after March 25, 1971, easier in Assam. The cut-off date as mentioned in the Assam Accord for detection and deportation of illegal Bangladeshi migrants from Assam is March 25, 1971 as per the Assam Accord that was signed on August 15, 1985 .
Assam shares 263 km of its border with Bangladesh. Of that, about 144 km is land and 119 km is river.
As many as 26 ethnic organisations, along withthe influential All Assam Students Union (AASU) have launched a statewide stir to oppose the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2016 which they say directly contradicts the historic Assam Accord which was signed in 1985 between AASU, Centre and state. It gives the right of citizenship to persecuted Hindus in Muslim-majority countries.
The incumbent BJP government in Assam has accorded top priority to the NRC update process.
Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal has announced that the process will be completed by end of 2017.
He has instructed DCs and SPs of the state’s districts to expedite the process of updating the NRC in their respective districts.
Even as the opposition Congress has alleged sluggish pace in NRC updating process, the NRC state coordinator, Protik Hajela informed “Works of NRC update exercise are going on at full swing. Speed cannot be allowed to bulldoze quality in a `once in a lifetime’ exercise wherein maintenance of accuracy has been emphasised by the Apex Court.
As such, verification works are being carried out at an optimum speed to ensure that there is no compromise with quality.”
A total of 68.21 lakh families have applied for inclusion in updated NRC, involving around 3.27 crores persons who have submitted 6.67 crore documents that have to be verified.
About 4.94 crore documents out of targeted 5.96 crores documents have already been verified.
“The task of NRC Update is “mammoth” with the verification works involving unprecedented volumes of physical verification, computerisation and digitization,” the official said.
The government of India on October 19 last sanctioned additional funds of Rs 620 crores for the NRC updating process.
This would increase the sanctioned amount to Rs. 908 crores from the earlier amount of Rs 288.18 crores.
