Pulak Gohain
Assam BJP general secretary Pulak Gohain addressing media persons on September 4, 2018 in Guwahati. Image - Northeast Now

The Assam BJP on Tuesday demanded that 13 different documents be considered by the National Register of Citizens (NRC) authority and the Ministry of Home Affairs as ‘admissible’ for inclusion of names in the NRC.

The State BJP has already submitted a memorandum to the State co-ordinator of NRC, Assam, Prateek Hajela in this regard.

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Talking to media persons here on Tuesday, State BJP general secretary Pulak Gohain said names of many indigenous people have been left out in the final draft NRC which was published on July 30 as they had no sufficient required documents.

“The NRC authority did not accept school certificates for which many indigenous people belonging to the Koch-Rajbongshi community, Adivasi community, Scheduled Castes and other backward communities, especially, who do not possess birth certificates or any other documents required, missed their names in the final draft NRC. So, we demand that school certificates or any one of the 13 listed documents be considered as admissible for inclusion of names in the NRC,” Gohain said.

Gohain also informed that the State BJP had dashed off a letter along with the supporting documents to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs stating about non-inclusion of many indigenous people of the State and urged the ministry to consider the listed documents as admissible for inclusion of names.

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The documents that the State BJP demanded to consider are: migration certificate, citizenship certificate, refugee card, camp inmate card, refugee eligibility card, grazing permits till 1971, khuti permits till 1971, tauji revenue receipts till 1971, cattle tax revenue receipts till 1971, revenue collection receipts till 1971, recruitment certificates for armed forces and revenue payment receipts issued by Forest Department.

Gohain, while talking on inclusion of suspected illegal migrants’ names in some areas, said, “We have noticed many discrepancies in the final draft NRC. Names of many illegal migrants were included in the draft NRC. Origin Indian people have missed their names. So, it is certain that there were some loopholes in the NRC update procedures.”

It may be mentioned that the Supreme Court on August 28 ordered sample re-verification of 10 per cent of the people in Assam who were included in the final draft NRC.