WHY NRC IS IMPORTANT FOR INDIA
National Register of Citizens is for the record of all the genuine Indian citizens residing in the state of Assam. The foundation of NRC dates back to 1951 when Government of India went on to formulate the ‘Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act, 1950’ mandating expulsion of illegal immigrants from the state of Assam. It was important to identify the illegal migrants and therefore NRC was prepared for the first time in 1951 by the Ministry of Home Affairs. Now, the Hon’ble Supreme Court has kept the updating of the NRC under strict guidelines and has been keeping a monitored check since 2013. The liberation of East Pakistan – Bangladesh emanated lakhs of illegal migrants into the territory of India, particularly that of Assam. The huge amount of immigrants has caused and has been causing stupendous amount of load on both the state government and the Central government. The distinctive identity of the Assamese people is bearing stupendous threat of being outnumbered in their own native land. My opinion runs parallel to the Assam Accord of 1985 and delivers to the eviction of illegal migrants consuming resources of our country.
Indira Gandhi in her 1971 interview to BBC said “One thing I must say I’m absolutely determined that refugees of all religions must all go back. We are not going to absorb them in our population.” The 1961 census had reported that more than 2 lakh infiltrant entered Assam and subsequently increased after formation of Bangladesh leading to a historical agitation running 6 years. The people agitated, particularly All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad (AAGSP), the continuous influx of migrants into Assamese land popping up the human populace and deteriorating the already scarce resources. They continued to protest until the Rajiv Gandhi’s government signed the Assam Accord in 1985. But much to their disbelief the Accord hardly did anything to their practical satisfaction. The accord called for detection, deletion, and expulsion in accordance of law but many years passed and nothing was at pursue.
At the mandate of the apex court of the country, the Central government and the State government were directed to update the long pending NRC complying The Citizenship Act, 1955. Under the jurisdiction of Supreme Court, a Writ Petition Civil cited 274/2009 was filed by Assam Public Works against Union of India in which the court cautioned the Union Government against any coercive actions based on the findings of the NRC report and directed them to evolve a process to deal with the claims of the excluded 40 Lakhs.
Section 5.8 of the Assam Accord clearly mentions “Foreigners who came to Assam on or after March 25th 1971 shall continue to be detected and expelled in accordance with law. Immediate and practical steps to be taken to expel such foreigners.”
Just like the Assam Accord, the process has to be broadly implemented in a three-stage administration. First, we need to ‘Detect’ all the illegitimate migrants who came after the midnight of 25th March 1971. This is a tricky challenge as over the years the migrants have mixed with the locals and identifying them is a time-consuming task. Over the time they made themselves enabled with free ration cards, fake documents, and some even with Aadhaar. The delay has already caused over-consuming of the national resources and burdening the nation of additional keeping of migrants. This ultimately hinders the growth of the land and that of the natives.
Once all such irregular migrants are identified the second step comes into foray. Second, we need to ‘Delete’ the names of such identified people from the national register enabling the government to officially tag them as unlawful and thereby, in accordance to the established law, act against them. All respective governments of the world can act appropriately against the illegal immigrants entering their countries according to the municipal law.
The third and the final step involve ‘Expulsion’. Many deported immigrants will also yield an opportunity for substantial shrinkage in unlawful activities such as crime, terrorism, espionage and continuous change in employment dynamics. The deporting of identified illegal immigrants back to the land they came from will decisively liberalise India from humongous expenses it draws on the protection of its citizen and preventing cross-border migration. It is said that around 40 Lakh prohibited people are residing in Assam affecting the daily lives of the native Assamese and crumbling on the economic opportunities our constitution bestows on the registered citizens. In his speech, Amit Shah committed to national security by tracing illegal immigrants and reiterated that NRC is the soul of the Assam Accord.
The National Register of Citizens shall be implemented to the “last full stop and comma” and by the process laid by the Hon’ble Supreme Court. It is for the betterment of Assamese population and for their homeland.
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By
VENUS ANAND
Executive Member
Section for Law Students, INBA