GUWAHATI, Dec 2 - With the Gauhati High Court expressing surprise at the inclusion of a declared foreigner�s name in the voters list, the State government has now decided to revisit the chain of coordination among all the stakeholders including the Border Police, Foreigner Tribunals, Election Commission and those involved in the update of draft NRC.
�The latest case of Jahura Khatun, who, despite being declared as a illegal foreign national, continues to enjoy voting rights, testifies that there was a lack of coordination between the stakeholders, which we are trying further strengthen,� said a senior Assam government official, requesting anonymity.
�Names of all the individuals who were declared foreigners by the Foreigner Tribunals (FT) will be verified again,� official sources told this reporter. As many as 21,676 persons were declared foreigners between August 15, 2015 and March 2017. The number of cases disposed during the same period stands at 84,721.
Nearly 1.90 lakh cases of suspected foreign nationals are still pending with the 100 FTs in the State and over 40,000 of declared foreigners of post-1971 stream continue to evade arrest.
Further, the number of those declared as �Not Foreigners� is over 63,000. However, of these 63,000-odd people, the State Level Scrutiny Committee has so far decided to challenge 45 of those cases with the Gauhati High Court.
�As per an official figure, the number of pending cases as on March 31, 2017 stood at 1,95,968,� sources told The Assam Tribune.
From the time when the number of FTs was increased from 36 to 100, the number of pending cases has not gone down much, with more and more cases coming to the fore.
Prateek Hajela, State NRC Coordinator asserted that necessary steps are being taken to ensure that names of those declared as foreigners by the tribunals do not find any place in the NRC.