Assam NRC: Of 40 lakh excluded people, 30 lakh file claims

Guwahati: Up to 29.7 lakh people, out of the 40.07 lakh who were left out of the final draft of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), filed their claims for inclusion as the last day of the window period ended on December 31, said sources.

Incidentally, about 2.65 lakh objections to names included in the final draft of the NRC published on July 30 were received in the last two days of the window period. Prior to this, about 700 objections to names were received by the NRC authorities.

According to reports, the highest number of objections were filed from Barpeta, Nagaon, Marigaon and Kamrup. One unofficial report also estimated that the number of objections filed in Barpeta alone was 75,000.

The NRC state authority will now initiate the digitisation of all claims and objections. Following this, NRC officials will send notices to the persons concerned. The process, according to reports, will be initiated by January 31.

The massive exercise to update the NRC in Assam, which is being monitored by the Supreme Court, had received around 3.29 crore applications, of which 40,07,707 did not feature in the final draft published on July 30.

For submission of claims and objections, the SC had extended the last date from December 15 to December 31 last year.

Earlier, the registrar general of India also notified that the update process of the NRC would be completed by June 30 this year.

Of the remaing 10 lakh people who did not submit their claim forms, according to the draft NRC published on July 30 last year, around 2.48 lakh applications are reportedly on hold as their head of the family was marked as doubtful or dubious voter (a category initiated in 1997 to chalk out illegal voters from electoral rolls).

Of the remaining 10 lakh people who did not submit their claims it is speculated that the bar on ‘change of legacy data’ came as a hurdle for them to submit the claims. The SC on request of the NRC state coordinator Pratik Hajela did not allow the change of legacy in the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) of the NRC update process.