While the online data of Assam’s National Register of Citizens (NRC) went missing from the official website, the office of the state NRC coordinator on Wednesday lodged an FIR against one of its former officials.
As per a media report, the FIR has been filed against the ex-official for leaving the office without surrendering the password to the data records system.
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The report quoted an official source as saying on condition of anonymity: “We have filed (FIR) against an NRC officer in a police station on Wednesday for not providing password to data records system.”
“The officer has left NRC office without handing over the password. This comes under the purview of the official secrets act and as a result all authorized officers are not able to access the data,” the source said.
However, it is known since when the NRC authority has remained without access to the data due to the non-availability of the passwords as the source denied divulging any details.
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The report further quoted the source as saying: “We can only say that the lady official left her job soon after Prateek Hajela left the state on an inter-cadre transfer to Madhya Pradesh in mid-November last year.”
The FIR has been lodged with the Paltan Bazar police station in Guwahati.
Paltan Bazar police have registered the case and started an investigation.
Meanwhile, the union ministry of home affairs on Wednesday clarified that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) data in Assam went offline due to a technical snag on the cloud.
Also read: Assam NRC data disappear from its official website
Ministry of home affairs said all Assam NRC data list was made offline from its official website due to non-renewal of contract with the IT firm Wipro.
The MHA added that it was ensuring that the data was safe and the snag would be resolved soon.
The home ministry’s clarification came after Congress took on the government over the issue calling that the “missing” of the data a “malafide act”.
Also read: Assam: NRC data goes offline due to technical snag, says MHA
The complete detail of exclusion and inclusion of bonafide Indian citizens in the NRC was uploaded on its official website ‘www.nrcassam.nic.in’ after the final list was published on August 31, 2019.
Officials said that the cloud service for the huge set of data was provided by Wipro and their contract was till October 19 last year.
However, this was not renewed by the earlier coordinator, Prateek Hajela.
The data got offline from December 15 after it was suspended by Wipro.
This resulted in panic especially amongst the people who have been excluded from the list as the rejection certificates were yet to be issued.
The final NRC excluded 19,06,657 persons. A total of 3,11,21,004 names were included out of 3, 30,27,661 applicants.