39 families of suspected illegal immigrants included in NRC draft

Assam citizen survey left out 40 lakh people when it was published on Monday.

As many as 39 families who are suspected to be illegal immigrants have been named in the complete draft of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), said a government officer in Assam on Thursday.

Congress party leaders raise slogans during a protest against controversial Assam's National Register of Citizen (NRC) draft in front of Assam House, in Kolkata on Thursday, Aug 2, 2018. (PTI Photo/Swapan Mahapatra) (PTI8_2_2018_000086B) (PTI)

The statement comes at a time when focus is on the 40 lakh people, including some with identity documents, who were left out of NRC that seeks to identify Indian citizens and weed out illegal immigrants.

“There are 39 families from our district who have been declared foreigners by tribunals, or they have been listed as doubtful voters, or (they) have cases pending in foreigners tribunals have been included in the complete NRC draft,” said Hemen Das, deputy commissioner of Morigaon district.

Officials at the NRC secretariat in Guwahati said mistakes will be rectified and illegal immigrants kept out of the final NRC list.

“We are shocked to hear this. The NRC updating process was undertaken with the intention of identifying illegal immigrants. Efforts should be undertaken to ensure their names are not there in the final list,” said Aabhijeet Sharma, president of Assam Public Works, a Guwahati NGO whose petition before the Supreme Court in 2009 led to the NRC updating process.