Guwahati | The final National Register of Citizens or NRC list was published on Saturday has excluded over 1.9 million people from the list which includes 3.11 crore people.
NRC is a list intended to identify legal residents and weed out illegal immigrants from Assam. It is aimed at identifying illegal immigrants who entered and settled in Assam, primarily from Bangladesh, after March 25, 1971 and deport them to their native country.
According to details made available by the state coordinator for NRC, a total of 19,06,657 applicants, of the 32.9 million who had applied to be included in the list that identifies Indian citizens and weeds out illegal immigrants, failed to make the final cut.
“Taking into account all the persons already included and after disposal of all Claims and Objections and proceedings under Clause 4(3), it has been found that a total of 3,11,21,004 number of persons are found eligible for inclusion in final NRC leaving out 19,06,657 number of persons including those who did not submit claims,” a press statement issued by NRC said.
“Those not satisfied with outcome can file appeal before Foreigners’ Tribunals,” it said.
Applicants would be able to know their status at NRC sewa kendras (NSKs) and offices of circle officers and deputy commissioners or log on to the NRC official site.
Thousands of applicants reached their nearest NSKs across the state early on Saturday morning and queued up to take a look at the final list to know their fate.
NRC State Coordinator Prateek Hajela signed press release said the entire NRC process was carried out objectively and transparently and every person was given adequate opportunity of being heard.
“The exercise of NRC Update is a mammoth exercise involving around 52,000 State Government officials working for a prolonged period. All decisions of inclusion and exclusion are taken by these statutory officers. The entire process of NRC update has been meticulously carried out in an objective and transparent manner. Adequate opportunity of being heard has been given to all persons at every stage of the process. The entire process is conducted as per statutory provisions and due procedure followed at every stage,” said the NRC release.
Security was beefed up ahead of the releasing. No violence or any incident has been reported yet.
The NRC has assured the ones left out that they can appeal to the Foreign Tribunals, and will not be immediately declared ‘foreigners’ or put into detention centres.
Various political parties and organizations including the ruling BJP, opposition Congress and All India United Democratic Front, and All Assam Students Union (AASU) have assured legal aid to those left out of the final list to file appeals.
Last year when the NRC was released in July, it had left out 4 million applicants, inviting massive criticism.
While majority of those left out of the earlier lists had filed claims seeking inclusion in the final NRC, 380,000 of them didn’t. NRC authorities had gone through their claims one more time before releasing the final list.
The final list of NRC in Assam comes 14 years after the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh chaired a meeting between the central government, the Assam government and the All Assam Students Union (AASU) where a consensus was developed that the National Register of Citizens should be updated to honour the promises made in the Assam Accord of 1985.
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