Guwahati: 15,000 Bhojpuris from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar left out of NRC

Guwahati: In what has intensified the demand for re-verification of the National Register of Citizens, more than 15,000 Bhojpuri speaking people having roots in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh but settled in Assam since 1950s are found to have been left out of the final NRC list.

Informing that a large number of people of such families settled on the north bank of Brahamaputra in Darrang and Udalguri districts failed to get their names incorporated in the NRC, the leaders of All Assam Bhojpuri Yuva-Chatra Parishad and All Assam Bhojpuri Sammelan said, “Despite submitting the requisite documents, thousands of Bhojpuri-speaking people living in Assam prior to 1971 and their descendants have been excluded from the NRC. It’s not only unfortunate, but also humiliating.”

The president of Bhojpuri speaking people Narendra Prakash Chouhan said that more than 4,000 people from Bhojpuri speaking families have been left out of the final NRC in Udalguri district alone. Mr Chouhan said that the ancestors of these NRC left-outs were brought to Assam mainly for agricultural activities when Mr Rajendra Prasad was the President of India.

He cited specific cases like that of Kanai Lal Chouhan, a 42-year-old farmer who hails from Uttar Barpukhuri village in Udalguri district. He, along with his three daughters, one son and two sisters, has been left out of the NRC. Kanai’s grandfather Sukhanandan Chouhan and father Dudh Nath Chouhan were mentioned in a court order relating to a land dispute passed on September 11, 1970 by the sub- divisional magistrate of Mangaldoi. This gave a strong reason to his family to claim that their forefathers settled in Assam.