The Supreme Court on Wednesday said that holding of Lok Sabha elections and work of publishing the final National Register of Citizens (NRC) should go on simultaneously in Assam.
The bench comprising of Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and justice Rohinton Fali Nariman informed that the deadline of July 31 for publishing the final NRC has to be strictly followed.
Assam NRC coordinator Prateek Hajela informed the bench that the Election Commission has agreed not to withdraw more personnel involved in NRC work for election duty.
However, Hajela informed that there would be a need to increase the manpower for NRC work after the Lok Sabha elections.
In reply to Hajela, the bench informed that the strategy taken for publication of the final NRC within the deadline of July 31 was not the apex court’s concern.
The court said it was scheduling at least one hearing in the NRC case every month to take stock of the progress. It scheduled the next hearing for April 10.
On February 5, the Centre told the apex court that 167 companies of central forces involved in NRC work needed to be pulled out for assigning them to election duties. However, the apex court rejected the Centre’s plea.
“The Ministry of Home Affairs is bent upon that NRC work is not carried out. The entire effort of the Ministry is to destroy this process. If you want NRC work to go on, there are 1,001 ways of doing it. The government is not co-operating,” Chief Justice Gogoi pointed out in response.