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Guwahati: Alleging
presence of names of illegal migrants in the Assam voters' list,
Assam Public Works (APW), an NGO, has sought the Supreme Court's
intervention in the matter. Abhijeet Sharma, secretary of the APW,
has moved a writ petition (civil) in the Supreme Court and
appealed to the apex court for directing the Government of Assam
to undertake the work related to upgradation of the of National
Registrar of Citizens (NRC) 1951 after proper identification of
those who settled in Assam, prior to March 25, 1971, along with
their descendants as Indian citizens.
The NGO had also demanded that the government must declare those
persons who settled in Assam after March 24, 1971 as foreigners.
The northeastern state has been suffering from the problem of
illegal influx from neighbouring Bangladesh. Various NGOs and
pressure groups in the state had alleged that the ruling
governments, particularly the Congress, had encouraged influx from
Bangladesh to secure their "votebanks."
The state's powerful students' body, the All Assam Students' Union
(AASU), had led a six -year-long students' movement from 1979 to
1985, aimed at identification and deportation of the illegal
infiltrators who settled in Assam.
The movement known as Assam movement ended in 1985 after signing
of the Assam Accord between the students' body, the central
government and the state government in 1985.
These organizations have set March 25, 1971 (the day civil war in
East Pakistan, which led to creation of Bangladesh, began) as the
cut-off date to determine "foreign infiltrators" in Assam.
The NGO, through the writ petition, has also called for direction
to the Government of Assam to start the work for updation of the
NRC immediately.
"It is believed that Assam's voters' list till to 2006 has 41 lakh
excess voters (over and above normal growth of voters). It can be
safely surmised that Assam's voter's list is saddled with names of
lakhs of foreigners," Sharma said.
"The population growth trend between 2004 to 2006 in the state
reflects that illegal immigrants have infiltrated into the whole
state and enrolled their names in the voters' list of the State,"
he said adding that the electoral roll of Assam in 2011 polls are
full of names of such "foreigners".
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