The curse of NRC: Why Assamese cleared as Indian citizens still feel like ‘foreigners’ in their own land

In March 2020, 70-year-old Seje Bala Ghosh, a resident of Bongaigaon district in Assam, got a knock at her door from a group of police personnel who curtly informed her that she was supposed to appear before the Foreigners Tribunal. Asked about the reason, Seje was told she is suspected of being an illegal migrant in India. Days later, she was declared a ‘foreigner’ and forced to move to a detention centre in her own country.

Early last month, Seje won a legal battle that proved she is an Indian citizen.

“I can finally breathe easy in my own land because I have proved that I am an Indian citizen through a legal battle. But it is very distressful and humiliating for me because they branded me a Bangladeshi,” Seje told The Federal.

As a widow, who had recently lost her son and depended on the kindness of neighbours to survive, Seje had no one to turn to for help with the paperwork. But back then, Seje wasn’t particularly worried. After all, her name had appeared in the final draft list of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) released on August 31, 2019. To her utter shock, however, the Tribunal declared her a foreigner. It was a cruel irony that she was declared a foreigner in a country whose freedom her father had fought for. Seje is the daughter of Lt (late) Digendra Chandra Ghosh who fought for India’s independence alongside Chandrashekhar Azad.

“I had to single-handedly face umpteen legal complexities sharing records proving my family’s Assamese roots pre-1951. I felt very helpless at that time because I had lost my son a few years ago and the neighbours were taking care of me,” Seje said.

Even though she has been declared an Indian citizen, the septuagenarian is disappointed with the system that subjected her to three years of harassment. She had to fight her case in court despite being wheelchair-bound after a broken leg.

“I am very disappointed with the system and the functioning of the Foreigners Tribunals because despite having all the documents, I was declared an illegal migrant. I was harassed by the system. But whoever brought this dishonour to my name will bear the consequences. Lord Krishna is keeping an eye on everything,” the old lady said.

On November 4, the Tribunal in its verdict acknowledged the validity of her documents. The decision not only restored her citizenship, but also served as a testament to her father’s legacy as a freedom fighter. But Seje received no apology from authorities and no compensation for the ordeal she was unnecessarily and inhumanely subjected to.

The system, many say, is designed to harass simple, poor people.

“The genuine Indian citizen faces harassment due to government mismanagement. The officials working at the Foreigners Tribunals target genuine Indian citizens to remain in the good books of their bosses. The people who have suffered the most are Bengalis and people with Bengali surnames. In many cases, we have seen genuine people face harassment after they are branded illegal immigrants, while those with doubtful credentials have all their paperwork,” said Dipak Dey, president of All Assam Bengali Federation.

Court orders establishing citizenship of people whose credentials have been put to question by the authorities come only as partial relief as the accusation causes permanent damage to a person’s reputation.

“We have seen that after a person was tagged as an illegal migrant or Bangladeshi, his position in the society suffered a blow. The social stigma is never erased and neighbours continue to doubt the person the court order notwithstanding, Dey said.

And when it comes to being profiled, the Bengali surname has become a curse.

“The system only targets the Bengali community due to their surname. It is very unfortunate and the government should develop a proper scientific mechanism to detect the illegal migrant and genuine Indian citizen. The Bengalis who are living in Assam face increased harassment and are mostly branded as Bangladeshi because their forefathers are from East Bengal. The Bengalis are politically deprived in Assam,” Dey claimed.

He contended that the condition of Bengalis in Assam is worse than the Rohingya refugees because Rohingyas are receiving help from international groups. On the other hand, Bengalis in Assam, who are branded as Bangladeshis, lack organised support.

The Assam unit of Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) is one of the very few organisations working in the area. In fact, Seje’s case was pursued by CJP only.

“Initially it was very tough for the old lady to appear before the Foreigners Tribunal in 2021. She had suffered a fracture in the leg and was wheelchair-bound. We provided legal and emotional support to her. We provided documents to demonstrate Seje was Lt (late) Digendra Chandra Ghosh’s daughter,” said CJP state-in-charge Nanda Ghosh.

But Seje’s is not the lone case. Many in Assam are fighting to prove their citizenship. Those who have won their cases after long years of legal battle, are fighting stigma.

Last week, Bimal Das (45) and his sister Suma (43) won their case which established them as Indian citizens. Bimal and Suma, who hail from Deopur in Karimganj, appealed against the order and were cleared by the Foreigners Tribunal-1 within two days of each other. Their fight continued for nearly two decades as their trouble began in 2006 when the Border Security Force branded them a people of “doubtful” origin in a monthly report.

Their lawyer Brajaballav Goswami said the father of the siblings, Nilmani Das (65), had also been labelled an illegal immigrant. He had his citizenship restored by the Foreigners Tribunal on August 8 this year. A refugee registration card in Nilmani's name and some other documents helped his cause.

None of them received any compensation or apology.

Abdul Choudhury, an advocate based in Silchar said, “Many people are branded as illegal immigrants because the investigation process has many loopholes. In most cases, the notices are served but the people don’t get them because it is not handed to the person in whose name the notice is served. Mostly, the notices are served in public places. Due to the loopholes in the government departments the genuine citizen faces harassment.”

“Many are incarcerated in the detention centre due to systemic failure,” Choudhury said.

According to the Centre, between 2017 and 2022, 14, 346 foreigners have been deported.

In its affidavit filed in the Supreme Court which is examining the constitutional validity of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act relating to illegal immigrants in Assam, the Centre said 17,861 people have been granted citizenship under the provision.

The Centre informed the court that 32,381 people have been detected as foreigners under the orders of the Foreigners Tribunal concerning the period of 1966-1971.

Section 6A of the Citizenship Act relates to illegal immigrants in Assam. The provision was inserted into the Citizenship Act as a special provision to deal with the citizenship of people covered under the Assam Accord.

Similarly, in another case a 50-year-old Assamese woman Dulubi Bibi, a resident of Cachar district’s Udharbond area, who was declared an illegal migrant due to a mismatch in her in voters' lists, proved her Indian citizenship after a six-year-long legal battle.

She was arrested in April 2018 and sent to a Silchar-based detention centre. After spending two years at the camp, she was released on bail in April 2020 after a Supreme Court directive.

Kamal Chakraborty, a social worker based in Assam helped Bibi with economic as well as legal advice and after a long legal battle, Bibi established her citizenship.

“Dulubi Bibi hailed from a poor family. They could not afford legal support. When I came to know about the matter I decided to help the family in their hour of crisis. I contacted the district legal service authority for legal aid to Bibi. After six years, it has been established that the Dulubi Bibi in the 1997 electoral roll is the same person as Dulabjan Begum in the 1993 voter list, and details of her father and grandfather could be traced back to the 1965 voter lists,” Chakraborty said.

“Cases like Dulubi Bibi’s are common only in Assam. The government needs to look into the functioning of the Foreigners Tribunal which is turning genuine citizens into foreigners,” he added.

Asked about NRC, CAA and the Tribunal system, Chakraborty said, “The Assam government spent Rs 1,600 crore on the NRC. Many people lost their lives in the process. Now, NRC is lying in cold storage awaiting revision. At present, the government administration does not consider this NRC as a document of citizenship, however, to get bail from the Tribunal their name should figure on the list. These things are beyond people’s comprehension. CAA too has not been implemented. In such a situation, these innocent people are being left high and dry by an apathetic administration.”

“I’ve helped 46 people get out of detention camps. Most of them were declared illegal immigrants but later they proved their Indian citizenship. I have spent Rs 1.70 lakh from my pocket to help the people who were financially poor and could not afford legal aid,” he said.

The final updated NRC for Assam, published on 31 August 2019, contained 31 million (3.1 crore) names out of its population of 33 million (3.3 crore), leaving out 1.9 million (19 lakh) applicants, rendering them potentially stateless. The Assam government filed a petition in the Supreme Court in November 2020 demanding review of the NRC list, calling it "defective".

Recently, Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the government is once again revisiting the NRC rolls and is going to detect the names that have been fraudulently entered into the same. He said that the government considers the security of Assam as paramount.

The question of NRC continues to be a subject of fear and uncertainty causing great distress to the people due to the unavailability of their Aadhaar cards. The intertwining of the NRC process with Aadhaar cards has further complicated the situation, leading to the unfortunate blocking of Aadhaar authentication of nearly 32 lakh people.

While the opposition attacks the government on the question of NRC, the government’s stance on the issue is adding to the anxiety on ground. As those trying to prove their citizenship scurry for legal and financial support, those who have proved it continue to fight stigma and feeling of hurt and injustice in the absence of any government help or apology.