Supreme Court admits writ petition for re-verification of Assam NRC

Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI: The Supreme Court of India today admitted a writ petition that sought a comprehensive re-verification of the entire NRC (National Register of Citizens) in Assam. The apex court issued notices to the Central Government, Registrar General of India (RGI), the Assam government, the Assam NRC coordinator, and other respondents, and sought their response.

Former state NRC coordinator Hitesh Dev Sarma filed the writ petition in the apex court. The petitioner sought a comprehensive re-verification of the NRC. Dev Sarma alleged that the NRC has massive errors. "Assam has people of doubtful nationalities. Such people might have got their names entered in the NRC," the petitioner said. "We want an error-free NRC for national interests," he added.

Senior advocate Manish Goswami, appearing for Hitesh Dev Sarma, said, "There were several concerns that the NRC contained major errors and was not error-free. In this regard, the former Assam NRC Coordinator filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court. We highlighted the glaring discrepancies before the apex court, and our plea was for a complete re-verification of the NRC. This case is not directed against anyone; our only demand is for an error."

A division bench of the apex court comprising Justice P Narsimha and Justice Atul S Chandurkar heard the writ petition today and admitted the same. The bench also issued notices to all respondents.

Earlier, the Assam government sought partial re-examination of the NRC - 20 per cent in the districts bordering Bangladesh and 10 per cent in other districts in the state.

Chief Minister Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma alleged that some techies had come to Assam during the NRC update exercise, created a lot of fake family trees by manipulating data, and made a mess of the entire NRC.

Over the years, the All Assam Students' Union (AASU) had also been demanding partial verification of the NRC so as to provide Assam an error-free citizens' register.

The first draft of the NRC was published on December 31, 2017, the complete draft of the NRC on July 30, 2018, and the final NRC on August 31, 2019. The names of around 40 lakh applicants were not included in the NRC. However, after the verifications of claims and objections, the number of applicants not included in the NRC dropped to around 20 lakh.

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