Unless extended by the Supreme Court on the plea that flood affected the last stages of work in at least three districts, the second and final draft of the updated National Register of Citizens (NRC) is scheduled to be published on June 30. Kuladhar Saikia, Assam’s Director-General of Police, does not foresee any law and order issues after publication of the final draft because of campaigns involving communities and strategic deployment of forces, he tells The Hindu in an interview. Excerpts.
The countdown to the NRC final draft has begun and there is a belief it could trigger violence if many are left out of the list. How challenging has the phase been after you took charge on April 30?
Our job is to face challenges and overcome them humanely. A massive exercise like NRC is a challenge in itself and our focus is on maintaining law and order. There is no threat perception because people, irrespective of community, have supported it. Going by the smoothness with which the first draft was published, we do not foresee any trouble.
But you have been holding high-level meetings with bureaucrats, top officers of the Army and paramilitary forces in districts deemed vulnerable.
This is routine for an exercise of this magnitude. The meetings have been part of our internal security review. We are assessing the situation across the State, not in specific areas only. Districts are chosen strategically for such meetings to cover adjoining districts. For instance, assessment of four districts was done in the last meeting in (central Assam’s) Nagaon.
How do you explain the State government’s request for 150 companies of additional forces?
We have taken all steps including sectoral deployment of forces. We are being provided additional forces as a precautionary measure. And one has to be prepared where law and order is concerned.
How did the police prepare for the post-NRC scenario?
We have taken the soft policing approach with our teams campaigning at the community level seeking the cooperation of the people while at the same time making it clear we will go hard against anyone found trying to break the law. In this age of connectivity, there is every possibility of post-NRC mischief being done through social media to whip up sentiments. Incidents of mob lynching and moral policing have in fact primed us for hate messages or other forms of online mischief in the days to come. Our force acted fast and arrested people based on evidence. Prompt action after potentially volatile social media posts helped us nip some mischief in the bud.