Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator from Assam’s Hojai constituency Shiladitya Dev on Tuesday said that at least two persons, who were declared foreigners by a Foreigners’ Tribunal, made it to the draft Assam NRC published last year.
This has been revealed by the Hojai MLA days after Supreme Court rejected the appeal of the state and Central governments for carrying out a sample re-verification of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam.
While addressing a press conference at Guwahati on Tuesday, Dev said, “There are many such examples from different parts of the state where names of people, who were declared foreigners by the Tribunals, appeared in the draft NRC.”
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Giving names, Dev said one Abdul Hannan was declared foreigner by a Foreigners’ Tribunal in Nagaon in 2017.
“Hannan was arrested and sent to detention camp in 2017. However, his name appeared in the draft NRC,” claimed Dev.
“His (Hannan) brother Mohammed Saiful was also declared foreigner by the Foreigners’ Tribunal at Lanka. He is still absconding. Saiful’s name also appeared in the draft NRC,” said Dev.
Dev also gave the ARN number of Hannan (which is 101830502039077300631) and questioned how can name of a person, who was declared as foreigner by a Foreigners’ Tribunal could enter the draft NRC.
The BJP legislator also said the responsibility of the NRC should be handed over to the state and central governments rather than NRC coordinator Prateek Hajela.
“The NRC cannot be a correct one unless the state and central governments take its responsibility,” he said while adding that with Hajela as the state coordinator, the NRC has become a one-man show, which is not good.