The Big Story: Citizenship tangle

With 4 million people left out of the draft National Register of Citizens released in July, the exercise, which aims to sift undocumented immigrants from Assamese residents, is one of the most dramatic events in the history of independent India. On Tuesday, more sparks flew as the Supreme Court threatened to jail Prateek Hajela, the coordinator of the National Register of Citizens in Assam, for contempt. The court, which in 2014 passed an order asking for the register to be updated, was angry that Hajela had spoken to the media.

On Sunday, Hajela had told journalists that the people left out of the draft register would not be jailed or deported. Even after the final National Register of Citizens is published, people would still have the right to appeal in the Foreigners Tribunal, he said. The angry court asked Hajela, “Are you in any manner concerned with the claims and objections to be made? What have you said in newspapers and tell us how are you concerned with that?”

That the Assam National Register of Citizens coordinator was speaking without the permission of the court is a point well taken. Yet, the court itself has not made any arrangements for information about the National Register of Citizens to be disseminated to the public in a timely manner – something that crucial, given the scale and importance of the exercise. The claims and objections process will run from August 30 to September 28, leaving barely any time for people to understand the process that could, in theory, result in them losing their Indian citizenship.

This is not the first time that flaws have been identified in the National Register of Citizens process. Crucial matters such as the strict method used to verify citizenship were decided by the court not in an open hearing but in a closed-door Power Point presentation. This requirement – which needed documentary proof of an ancestor who lived in Assam pre-1971 – was so strict that even educated people have struggled to meet it. Panchayat certificates were first rejected by the Gauhati High Court as an admissible to prove citizenship. This was then overturned by the Supreme Court. However, on the ground, it seems panchayat certificates have been rejected, putting as risk mainly women who often have no other means of identification.

The confusion has meant that even a number of prominent residents of Assam have failed to find their names on the NRC. These include the family members of a former President of India, a former chief minister of Assam, family members of a former deputy speaker of Assam and even a sitting MLA. In one family, a girl of six made it to the draft NRC but her twin brother and elder sister did not.

At this stage, more communication around the process and the fate of 4 million people not on the draft National Register of Citizens is the need of the hour. If it is concerned about incorrect information being disseminated, perhaps the court could establish a mechanism to ensure that anxious people in Assam have access to the particulars they are desparately seeking.

The Big Scroll

  • Why relatives of former president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed are not on Assam’s final NRC draft.
  • In Mangaldoi, where the Assam Movement began, some Bengali Muslims still wait to be counted as citizen.
  • In a Hindu colony in Assam’s Barak Valley, every family has someone left out of the NRC.

Punditry

  • Karunanidhi advocated a separate Tamil Eelam, but was careful not to encourage any attempt to stoke separatist sentiments in Tamil Nadu, writes K Venkataraman in the Hindu.
  • We’ve already lost the data privacy battle, argues Rajkamal Rao in the Hindu Business Line.
  • How can the backlash against global economic integration be contained? In Bloomberg, Lawrence H Summers writes on how the global economy could me made to work for everyone.

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