Because the final NRC is yet to be formally notified, seven years after Assam’s National Register of Citizens (NRC) excluded 1.9 million people, the Centre has told the Supreme Court that the process of issuing rejection slips to them has not even begun.
The Supreme Court on Monday adjourned the matter to November 6 after the Assam government sought time to file its response. The Supreme Court had specifically directed the state NRC coordinator on May 8, 2018 to develop a mechanism for issuing rejection slips to people excluded from the final list so that they could challenge their exclusion before foreigners tribunals.
Those dissatisfied with the outcome were entitled to challenge the decision before foreigners tribunals. But the absence of rejection slips has left excluded persons without the document envisaged by the Supreme Court to facilitate that challenge. The court had directed that the list of inclusions and exclusions be made available to the state government, Centre and RGI only after such safeguards were put in place.
After years of protest in the northeastern state where demographic changes have always been a lightning rod, the Assam government announced it was updating NRC in 2015, following the Centre’s December 2013 notification. Every person had to map either themselves or a family member to the 1951 NRC rolls or the electoral rolls before the midnight of March 24, 1971 – the day before the 1971 war in Bangladesh began. The deadline was in accordance with the 1985 Assam accord. Under the procedure contemplated for NRC, such appeals could be filed within 120 days. The Assam government has around 100 quasi-judicial foreigners tribunals for adjudicating citizenship-related claims. The delay in finalising the process is linked in part to the Supreme Court’s August 13, 2019 direction that the NRC data be protected through a security regime similar to that governing Aadhaar data.
RGI has also informed the Supreme Court that the question of issuing NRC cards to those included in the final list is pending before the court in separate proceedings.
