The first draft of the updated National Register of Citizens (NRC), an exercise undertaken only in Assam, will be made public at midnight on December 31. The main objective of this exercise is to identify illegal Bangladeshi immigrants.
-According to the state finance minister, all those whose names do not figure in the NRC will have to be deported.
-The NRC is being updated in Assam for the first time after 1951 to identify those who may have entered the state after March 25, 1971, a date agreed in the Assam Accord signed between the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and the Centre in 1985.
-The names of those who can prove links with family members whose names appeared in the 1951 NRC or subsequent electoral rolls till March 25, 1971 will be included in the updated NRC.
-Entry of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, which has been going on allegedly for decades, is a contentious issue. Many fear an unabated influx is a threat to the state’s indigenous population as well as national security.
About National Register of Citizens
-The National Register of Citizens (NRC) is the register containing details of all Indian citizens. After conducting the Census of 1951, the National Register of Citizens (NRC) was prepared by recording particulars of all the persons enumerated during the 1951 Census.
-After the conduct of the Census of 1951, a National Register of Citizens (NRC) was prepared in respect of each village showing the houses or holdings in a serial order and indicating against each house or holding the number and names of persons staying therein, and in respect of each individual, the father’s name/mother’s name or husband’s name, nationality, sex, age, marital status, educational qualification, means of livelihood or occupation and visible identification mark. This was done by copying out in registers the particulars recorded during the Census done in 1951. This NRC was prepared under a directive from the Ministry of Home affairs (MHA).
-The NRC is being updated to include the names of those people or their descendants who appear in the NRC, 1951, or in any of the electoral rolls up to the midnight of March 24, 1971, or in any one of the other admissible documents issued upto midnight of March 24, 1971, which would prove their presence in Assam or in any part of India on or before March 24, 1971 The NRC updation started in 2010 after a tripartite agreement signed between the Centre and the state government and All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) on May5,2005.
But its pace remained slow, and could only gather
steam after BJP came to power in the state. The party has made illegal infiltration a poll issue
A part draft is being released on December 31 and a final one will be issued later, followed by the final publication of the NRC.
