The first draft of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) for Assam was revealed on the intervening night of Sunday and Monday.
"It is a part draft. It contains 1.9 crore persons who have been verified till date. The rest of the names are under various stages of verification," Registrar General of India (RGI) Sailesh Kumar said at a press conference where he revealed the first draft and added that the process would likely be completed in 2018.
NRC is a register containing names of Indian citizens, which was prepared for the only time in 1951 and is being updated for only Assam to weed out illegal immigrants.
The organisation had received a total of 3.29 crore applications for the verification and remaining names will be out after they are thoroughly vetted and will be revealed in the subsequent drafts as per the direction of the Supreme Court that is overseeing the whole process.
Speaking about the next draft, the RGI said, "We will be taking it to the Supreme Court because they have guided us. (SC has) held more than 40 hearings over the last three years. We have a hearing scheduled in the month of February where we will place all the facts before the honourable court and based on the directions we will receive, we will thereafter decide when the draft will be published."
He informed that the process began in December 2013 and the applications were invited for the state of Assam in 2015.
The NRC that went online today can be checked in any of the three sites, viz., nrcassam.nic.in, assam.mygov.in and assam.gov.in. wherein the applicants can check their names by entering their Application Receipt Number (ARN).
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