Strange as it may sound, Indians do not have an identity. They are citizens because they believe that they are. A few documents like passports, birth certificates and Aadhaar do exist, but these have no pan-India acceptance. A small beginning was made in this direction on July 30, when the draft list of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) was released, identifying genuine residents of Assam. It was long overdue because the distinction between them and illegal settlers had become blurred and their cultural and linguistic identities had been disfigured.
The NRC did not come cheaply. People of Assam had to agitate for years, compelling the government to prepare it in 1951. But its documentation left them hugely disappointed. People reacted violently, angry at the state’s apathy and relentless influx of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants. Rajiv Gandhi, then Congress Prime Minister, was forced to sign the Assam Accord on August 15, 1985, agreeing that the NRC of 1951 would be updated with names of those that had appeared in the electoral rolls of March 1971.
The Congress, however, dragged its feet over implementing the Accord, for fear of losing votes of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants and kept the revision of NRC on hold. Finally, the Supreme Court directed the Registrar General of India to update the NRC of 1951 as per the criteria, laid down in the Assam Accord. Congress again delayed the process, apprehensive of its adverse impact on the parliamentary election in 2014 and state election in the following year.
But with BJP forming governments in the Centre and the state, the process of updating NRC was expedited. By December 1, 2017, vetting of claims of 1.9 crore of 3.29 crore applicants was completed and on July 30, 2018, an NRC draft list was released after verifying claims of the remaining applicants.
The list identifies 2,89,83,000 as legal residents and 40,07,000 as ineligible for citizenship. In the list, 2,48,000 voters—whose names had figured in the electoral rolls of March 24, 1971—have been found ‘doubtful’. However, those left out of the list can still file their claim on the inclusion and exclusion of names to the State Coordinator from August 30 onwards. The final NRC list is due for release by the end of the year but given our self-deceiving stance on vital issues of national interest, who knows if the timeline will be adhered to.
Barring BJP, the reaction of political parties that vie for Muslim votes has been crazy. Congress, caught in a bind because it had initiated the NRC, accuses that several names have been excluded for communal and political reasons. It is true that some discrepancies are glaring but in any enumerative exercise of this magnitude and complexity, errors are common and will surely get rectified.
The irrepressible West Bengal Chief Minister hallucinates that NRC will unleash a bloody civil war in the country. Probably, she is unaware that the issue of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants hardly affects the daily lives of 90 percent Indians. She also smells a sinister design to expel Bengalis and keep Assam only for the Assamese. She should know that several names of those from Nepal and other parts of India also do not figure in the list.
Her other compatriots—SP, BSP, RJD, JD(S), NCP, AAP, CPI(M) etc—whose dependence on Muslim votes is critical, decry this process as divisive and inhuman, while Muslim hardliners accuse BJP of using NRC to ‘Hinduise’ Assam first and then, the rest of India. But the list makes no distinction between illegal Muslim or Hindu immigrants from Bangladesh.
Social activists and liberals have nightmares of the unknown—Will illegal immigrants be declared stateless and deprived of voting rights, social welfare and health benefits and employment? Will they be forcibly pushed back and killed if they resist deportation? Will they be herded in detention camps, etc. They want people of Assam to accept the illegal immigrants as fait accompli and allow them to enjoy their fundamental rights as before. Sadly, they have no tears for genuine residents who feel like foreigners in their own land.
It will be a supreme folly to delay or dilute the publication of the final NRC list. A call can always be taken later, on where and how to settle the illegal immigrants, keeping in view our civilisational values, security needs and the economic and social cost that we can bear. Assam has lit the path for the country to have an NRC so that people can define themselves as citizens of India. Let us not waste this opportunity by fanning communal passions and raising war cries.
Amar Bhushan
Former special secretary, Research and Analysis Wing
amarbhushan@hotmail.com