GUWAHATI, Sept 21 - Though the final National Register of Citizens (NRC) has been published excluding names of more than 19 lakh applicants, the officials engaged in the process are yet to be released as some formalities are yet to be completed. Meanwhile, the office of the State Coordinator is planning to start the process of issuing rejection slips to the people left out of the NRC soon.
Official sources told The Assam Tribune that with the publication of the final NRC, only the ceremonial part of the process was completed and some key areas are yet to be covered. One of the major tasks before the State Coordinator�s office would be to issue rejection slips to the people left out of the NRC.
Sources said the reasons for rejecting the applications of the people left out of the NRC would be mentioned in detail in the rejection slips so that those people would be able to approach the foreigners tribunals. It may be mentioned here that in addition to a hundred tribunals active in the State, the government has initiated steps for setting up 200 new tribunals to expedite the process of disposal of the cases.
The second most important part is the storage and digitization of all the records, including the documents submitted by the applicants for inclusion of names in the NRC. Sources said that all the data and records would have to be stored properly for future use whenever required and quality checks of the process of digitization would have to be carried out by senior officers.
Around 5,000 officers of the government were engaged in the process of final verification and none of them has been released from the duty as of today and they are likely to be released only after the entire process is completed. However, the NRC Seva Kendras are likely to be wound up in a phased manner.
Meanwhile, the office of the State Coordinator will have to keep functioning as the process of updating the NRC will not end with the publication of the final NRC. The document will have to be updated continuously as the names of the children born after 2015, which was the cut-off year for submitting applications for inclusion of names in the NRC, will have to be included.
Similarly, the names of the persons against whom cases are going on in foreigners tribunals were not included and if any such names are cleared by the tribunals, these would have to be included. The persons, whose names are rejected, have the right to appeal before the tribunals and if their appeals are upheld, their names will have to be included.
