Assam’s coordinator for the National Register of Citizens Prateek Hajela on Saturday said a section of declared foreigners and doubtful (D) voters may have enrolled themselves in the final draft of the document by changing their names, addresses or using another person’s legacy data, The Telegraph reported.
Hajela said efforts were being made to identify such people and delete their names from the final draft of the citizenship register.
The Assam government published the final draft of the NRC on July 30. Around 40 lakh people did not find mention in the list out of 3.29 crore applicants.
“What we have published is only a draft and our work is still continuing,” Hajela said. “We are doing our best to detect and delete names of declared foreigners and D-voters from the draft. Our process will end only with publication of the final NRC.”
In Morigaon district, officials have identified around 200 people declared foreigners and those facing cases related to their citizenship who were included in the NRC. “These 200 belong to 39 families scattered across the district,” Morigaon Deputy Commissioner Hemen Das told The Hindu. “Some of them are declared foreigners while others are suspected illegal immigrants with cases pending. We are deleting their names from the list suo motu so that people don’t lose their faith in the system.”
In Hojai district, the police have filed chargesheets against 91 people who submitted fake documents while enrolling in the NRC. “The civil administration had filed 24 cases against such people when the NRC first draft was being published,” Hojai Superintendent of Police Ankur Jain told The Hindu. “Their papers were found to be forged.”
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