GUWAHATI: Assam Public Works (APW), a city-based NGO and the original petitioner in the Supreme Court which triggered the process of updating the National Register of Citizens (NRC) about seven years back, has demanded 100 per cent re-verification of the citizens’ register before the Assembly elections in Assam.
“We cannot accept the NRC in its current form. So we propose 100 per cent verification of the NRC and omission of all illegal voters from the register for a flawless and error-free voters’ list. The process can be completed in six months’ time and till then the Assembly elections (scheduled in 2021) can be deferred, just like the postponement of the BTAD elections due to the coronavirus outbreak earlier this year,” APW president, Abhijeet Sharma said while addressing media persons here on Monday.
Alleging that the names of over 80 lakh illegal voters have been included in the final NRC published last year, Sharma said that “it has been proven that from 1985 onwards, lakhs of Bangladeshis have been included in the voters list for which a corrective exercise is imperative. Else, the outcome of the NRC would be zero.”
He further urged both the Centre and the state government to submit affidavits in Supreme Court and initiate the NRC re-verification process.
The APW, it may be recalled, had filed a case in Supreme Court to exclude the names of 41 lakh illegal voters from the voters’ list of 2006.
Sharma regretted that despite at least six affidavits submitted by APW in the apex court since mid-2018, nothing has been done in regard to re-verification of the NRC.
Alleging that a conspiracy was hatched to include “Bangladeshis” in the final NRC draft, the APW president pointed out that the entire update exercise has been farcical.
“Of the 19 lakh people left out of the final NRC draft, about 3.90 lakh of them are indigenous citizens. The others, comprising doubtful voters, can easily approach the foreigner tribunal courts and get their names included in the final NRC draft,” he said.