10% NRC exclusion to be reverified

Centre says besides legacy documents, eligibility papers must

The first draft of the NRC for Assam was published on the intervening night of December 31 and January 1 in accordance with the top court’s direction. Names of 1.9 crore people were included.

Assam, which had faced influx of people from Bangladesh since the early 20th century, is the only state having an NRC which was first prepared in 1951.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered re-verification of 10 per cent of the people in Assam who were excluded from draft National Register of Citizens (NRC) published recently.

The top court while questioning the Centre on the need for re-doing the verification exercise from claimants who are left out in the 40 lakh NRC through a new document, sought a confidential report on possible ramifications if the people are allowed to claim legacy through a different family member. A Bench of justices Ranjan Gogoi and Rohinton Nariman while examining the NRC and the standard operating procedure (SOP) expressed reservations over a clause providing for submission of any new document, which were not submitted earlier by those who are left out in the NRC.

Justice Gogoi told the Attorney General K.K. Venugopal that the government could not “re-start” the whole exercise of verification of names by permitting the claimants to establish a fresh legacy.

Justice Gogoi pointed out that the Centre’s decision that the claimants can submit “additional admissible legacy and linkage documents” amounts to “restarting” the NRC verification exercise afresh leading to undesirable consequences.

For instance, Justice Gogoi pointed out that a person might have earlier submitted a linkage document to establish a legacy with a person as his father, which might have been rejected in the NRC. But now in the wake of the SOP, the same person can claim a legacy with another person citing him as his grandfather. This, the court pointed out, would lead to an anomalous situation as the entire “family tree can be changed by a person on account of the decision to grant a person liberty to file additional documents.

Mr. Venugopal, appearing for Centre, said apart from the legacy documents, a claimant must also furnish other eligibility documents.

The Bench posted the matter for further hearing on September 5.