Assam urges Election Commission to consider NRC in electoral roll revision: Report

Amid the Election Commission of India's ongoing exercise of Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in poll-bound Bihar, the Assam government is learnt to have urged the poll panel to factor in the National Register of Citizens while deciding the list of eligible documents for a similar exercise in the state, The Indian Express reported citing sources in the state government.

The Assam government, in its request to the EC, has said that it is the only state to have carried out the NRC exercise, and since the poll panel is also looking at the citizenship aspect to determine eligibility for inclusion in the electoral roll, the NRC, once published, could be one of the admissible documents for the SIR.

The development comes amid the Opposition's pointed criticism of the EC's Bihar SIR exercise claiming that it was a de-facto citizenship verification exercise that amounted to rolling out the "NRC through the back door" and that it fell outside the purview of the poll panel's mandate.

The Assam government's request to the EC came after the latter's announcement of a nationwide Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls starting with Bihar. The inclusion of the NRC as one of the documents, however, could translate into delays in conducting the SIR in the state since the Assam NRC remains in abeyance.