Supreme Court admits petition seeking re-verification of Assam NRC

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has admitted a writ petition demanding a revision of the draft National Register of Citizens (NRC) and its supplementary list for Assam.

The court has issued notices to the Union government, the state government, the Assam NRC authority, and the Registrar General of India (RGI) seeking their responses.

The order, passed on August 22 by a bench of Justices P.S. Narasimha and Atul Chandurkar, comes just months ahead of the state’s assembly elections.

The petition was filed by former NRC coordinator Hitesh Dev Sarma, a close aide of Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma. In court, senior advocate Manish Goswami, representing Dev Sarma, argued, “There were several concerns that the NRC contained major errors and was not error-free. In this regard, the former Assam NRC Coordinator filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court.”

He added, “We highlighted the glaring discrepancies before the apex court, and our plea was for a complete re-verification of the NRC. This case is not directed against anyone; our only demand is for an error.”

The NRC process, supervised by the apex court, led to the publication of a draft list in July 2018, which excluded 1.9 million applicants. A supplementary list, released in August 2019, included over 31.1 million names found eligible. However, the final register has not yet been notified, leaving the process in limbo.

The chief minister has repeatedly demanded re-verification, arguing that the number of exclusions is too low to account for the scale of “illegal immigrants” in Assam. In 2021, he said his government would seek re-verification of 20% of entries in border districts and 10% in interior areas.

The All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), a key player in the state’s anti-foreigner agitation, has also criticized the NRC outcome, calling the 1.9 million figure “too low.”

Hitesh Dev Sarma previously urged a “complete, comprehensive and time-bound” re-verification under Clause 4(3) of the Citizenship (Registration of Citizens and Issue of National Identity Cards) Rules, 2003. In 2020, he told the Gauhati High Court that instead of addressing anomalies, the RGI had directed the NRC office to close the exercise and issue rejection slips — an essential step before excluded persons can approach Foreigners Tribunals.

Political observers note that while the BJP oversaw the NRC update, it rejected the draft outcome, as many of those excluded were Bengali Hindus — a key support base for the party in Assam.

With the process stalled and rejection slips yet to be issued, the Supreme Court’s decision to entertain the plea could reignite the debate over the future of the NRC in Assam.