Filing of claims and objections to resume from September 25, says SC

Amidst the row over inclusion of names in the National Register of Citizens, the Supreme Court on Wednesday said that the filing of claims and objections would begin from September

Amidst the row over inclusion of names in the National Register of Citizens, the Supreme Court on Wednesday said that the filing of claims and objections would begin from September 25 and will continue for two months till November 25.

A claimant can rely on 10 of the 15 documents mentioned in the list of documents to get their names enrolled in the NRC. The Supreme Court bench of Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Rohington Fali Nariman ruled this today considering the affidavit filed by NRC state coordinator Prateek Hajela.

The NRC co-ordinator had suggested the apex court to cut down the number of documents to claim citizenship to 10 from 15. A set of 10 documents will be considered valid in the first one month for claiming citizenship.

This list of documents include- land related documents, Permanent Resident Certificates, Passport, Life Insurance Policy, Permits issued by the Government, Certificate of government service, documents related to accounts in Banks and post offices, birth certificates, certificates citing educational qualification issued by education board or universities.

Meanwhile, keeping the issue of the remaining 5 documents open, the Supreme Court said it will hear the matter of furnishing these documents to include names in the NRC on October 23 which is the next date of hearing.

The Centre and the Assam government, meanwhile, informed the apex court that the 5 documents are valid and must be considered for claiming citizenship.

The Apex Court also ruled that filing of claims and objections will begin from September 25 and the period of filing the claims and objections has been increased from a 30-day period to 60 days thus ending on November 25.

The court also made clear that the second opportunity has been granted to the citizens considering the magnitude of the issue. It may be mentioned that nearly 40 lakh people could not make it to the NRC final draft in Assam.

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