Assam NRC: Dec15 deadline for filing claims, objection

The Supreme Court on Thursday brushed aside objections raised on acceptance of five documents, including ration cards, by the people for making claims for entry into the final draft National Register for Citizens (NRC), prepared in Assam.

“We can't accept your idea of better to exclude a genuine person than to include one on the basis of a forged document,” a bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and R F Nariman told NRC coordinator Prateek Hajela.

The court rejected the objections on documents— Names in NRC, 1951; Electoral Roll up to 24th March, 1971; Citizenship Certificate; Refugee Registration Certificate; certified copies of pre-1971 Electoral Roll, particularly, those issued from the state of Tripura and ration card— for accepting citizenship claims.

The court, however, clarified that these documents would be accepted subject to “vigorous verification and complete satisfaction of the authorities”.

“We are of the view that Hajela's objections on five documents are on the basis of possibility of misuse, which can't be accepted to exclude genuine persons, the bench said.

The court also approved the standard operating procedure for accepting claims and objections from about 40-lakh people left out from the final draft NRC.

It gave a time schedule of last date of filing claims as December 15, issuing notice on such claims as January 15 and commencing the process of verification from April 1, 2019.

In the NRC list published on July 30, out of 3.29 crore people, the names of 2.89 crore were included.

The names of 40,70,707 people do not figure in the list. Of these, 37,59,630 names have been rejected and the remaining 2,48,077 are put on hold.