Day 8 Arguments

May 8th 2019

A 2 Judge Bench of the Supreme Court is monitoring the inclusion and exclusion of individuals in the updated National Register for Citizens of Assam so as to ensure that the NRC as mandated by the Assam Accord of August 15th 1985 may be published.

The Bench comprising CJI Ranjan Gogoi and RF Nariman J was scheduled to hear the matter today at 3 PM. However, the case was taken up for hearing at 10:30.  The State Coordinator for the NRC, Mr. Prateek Hajela submitted his report and informed the  Bench of CJI Gogoi and Nariman J that though the process for adjudication of claims was ongoing, persons who had objected to the non-inclusion of their names in the first draft of the NRC had not appeared before the relevant authorities in most cases.

At this point CJI Gogoi informed Mr. Hajela that the law would takes its course and irrespective of whether the persons were appearing before the authorities to support their claims, the endeavour must be to complete the NRC process by July 31st and not a day later. The Court would have the option to exercise fair discretion in accordance with the law when determining the case of those who had failed to appear in support of their claims.

The Bench accordingly directed the Coordinator, Mr. Hajela to continue the NRC work and has listed the case for hearing on July 10th once the Court reopens after summer vacations.

The Court also granted the State Coordinator the liberty to make a mention of the case before the Registrar for an urgent hearing during the summer vacations in the event that a need for the same arises.