NRC will be reviewed and made afresh; talks with All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) are ongoing, repeated once again by Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma.
The New Jolt to the ‘Anti-NRC Brigade’
North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) Founder and Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma has repeated once again that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) should be reviewed and made afresh and he is also in talks with AASU on this matter. The Assam BJP had put this in their election manifesto, that they will make efforts for “correction and reconciliation of entries”.
We had said earlier also that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) should be reviewed and done afresh. Our discussion with the All Assam Students' Union (AASU) is going on: Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma in Guwahati (27.03) pic.twitter.com/cyKR76Y1qa
— ANI (@ANI) March 27, 2022
The Statement of Assam CM has not gone down well with the opposition and some Muslim organizations. The President of All Assam Minority Students’ Union, Rejaul Karim Sarkar opposed this move and said we won’t accept re-verification of NRC.
Karim said, “NRC re-verification demand itself is politicizing the citizenship document and the motive is to stop its completion. NRC was updated with the Supreme Court monitoring the exercise. If the state government goes to the Supreme Court again on NRC re-verification, we will also take legal steps”.
NRC Final Draft and Discrepancies within it
The final draft of NRC published in August 2019 had excluded around 19 lakh people which many experts claim to be an undercount. Moreover many of the illegal Bangladeshi Muslim immigrants had made through to the list while some Hindus had been left out.
Read More: Hindus excluded from the NRC list in Assam have NO REASON to fear
To solve all these discrepancies the Assam Government had sought to review 20% sample of the list in border areas and 10% in internal areas. If the list doesn’t tally, the government would then ask for the directions of the Supreme Court. The Assam government last year approached the Supreme Court for NRC re-verification.
Read More: Himanta has a foolproof plan to implement NRC in Assam as his government approaches the Supreme Court for its re-verification
Assam Accord 1985 & Clause 6
The Assam Accord was a culmination of a movement against immigration from Bangladesh. It was signed between the then PM Rajiv Gandhi and AASU. The NRC process is undergoing as per provision of this accord. Cut-off date for NRC in this accord was set as March 24, 1971.
Clause 6 of the accord has not been implemented till now. Last year the Union Cabinet appointed a high-level panel to implement this clause. The clause states “Constitutional, legislative and administrative safeguards, as may be appropriate, shall be provided to protect, preserve and promote the cultural, social, linguistic identity and heritage of the Assamese people.”
The State Government formed an eight member committee for making a roadmap for the implementation of all aspects of Assam Accord. The body will consist of three cabinet ministers of the Assam government and five members will be from AASU, Assam’s premium student union that led the movement against the illegal Bangladeshi immigrants.
Read More: Busting misconceptions on CAA, NRC and NPR- Three absolute necessities for a truly resurgent India
The NRC matter has great importance for the Assamese people and every minute event or notification affect vast population of Assam. If the people find the exercise against their Assamese Culture, protests may start which had previously turned into violent ones.
Hence, it is good to see that the government and AASU seems to be on the same page and the Government is protecting the Assamese culture and correcting the discrepancies that had arisen during the previous exercise and the demand to implement clause 6 is been looked into by expert panels.
