Detecting Indians
By our Staff Reporter
GUWAHATI, June 19: Will the NRC set to be updated in Assam be the cure-all document in so far as problems relating to citizenship are concerned in the State? Former minister Himanta Biswa Sarma says that the document will miss that status if the loopholes in the update process are not plugged now.
Talking to newsmen in the city today, Sarma said: "There are Hindi and Bengali-speaking Indians who entered Assam after 1971. According to the criteria being followed in the NRC update process in the State, the 'updated NRC' won't have the mes of such Indians staying in the State. This will make the notion - a person of Assam whose me does not figure in the updated NRC is a foreigner - uble to stand. In such cases, a second inquiry will be a must to ascertain such persons' Indian citizenship. Since this issue is not within the ambit of the State Government, it has to take it up with the Register General of India."
"This apart, the NRC form is very complicated. Common people can't fill it up. They have to take the help of advocates spending Rs 400/500 in filling up the forms. A white corruption is going on in the State. When I was a minister, I did moot the necessity of facilitators, but my suggestion fell on the deaf ear of the government. NRC facilitators are a must in the NRC update process," Sarma said, and added: "Tea Tribes and indigenous people of Assam, whose mes are found in the 1971 voters' list should get direct entry in the NRC. By indigenous people, Sarma means, SCs, STs and the communities seeking ST status."
Sarma said: "The NRC form seeks the linkage of minors with their fathers. However, there are many in Assam who don't have such documents. If the father is an Indian, his sons and daughters should also be taken as Indians."
According to Sarma, there was a conception that the abrogation of the IM(DT) Act would pave the way for deportation of all foreigners from the State, but that has been proved to be a misconception now. "If we want the NRC not meeting the fate that of IM(DT) Act, Dispur should take up all these issues with the RGI so as to make NRC an error-free and cure-all document for citizenship problems," he said.
Meanwhile, the former education minister gave the credit of BPL students doing well in the HSLC and HS examitions this year. On the Chief Minister's announcement of refunding the fees paid by BPL students during their admissions into colleges, Sarma, however, said that the Chief Minister should instruct the college authorities to refund the fees to BPL students now so as to let them buy books.
On the arrest of Akhil Gogoi, Sarma said that the incident would affect the prospects of the Congress. "When a person has gone to stage fast for three days, he should have been allowed to do that. He would have left the place on the fourth day on his own. However, the arrest let Akhil Gogoi earn people's sympathy. He also got the support of brilliant students as his is a fight against anomalies in selection of candidates. When a person is arrested by a government again and again, people term the government as autocratic."