The West Bengal has not verified more than one lakh name sent to them for verification. The NRC sources confirmed that more than 1.25 lakh documents of people of West Bengal origin was sent for verification and only 11000 have been returned since 2015.
West Bengal was the biggest defaulter in the NRC verification process pertaining to people who belong to a different State but reside in Assam due to various reasons, Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India Sailesh said on Wednesday.
Sailesh, who oversaw the entire exercise of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), also said that he had deputed his own staff to help the West Bengal Government in collecting the documents sought by the NRC authorities, but the efforts were not fruitful.
"The largest number of documents that we have not received among all States was from West Bengal. We had to struggle. We had to follow up. But we have not received a substantial number of documents from West Bengal. The response (of West Bengal) in terms of results was not satisfactory," he said.
The draft NRC, a list of Assam's citizens, was published on July 30 that excluded 40 lakh residents of Assam. Most of the names were excluded due to lack of proper documents proving Indian citizenship.
Sailesh also said that there was a meeting through video conference between the officials of the West Bengal Government and the NRC authorities during which a request was made to send the responses.
"West Bengal was the only State where we made an exception by deputing my own staff to assist the State Government. But we have not received all required documents for the draft NRC," said Sailesh.
Asked about the number of documents that the West Bengal did not provide, Sailesh said it would be a "substantial number".
The comments bear significance as West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee continues to attack the BJP and the Central Government over the draft NRC in Assam, accusing the party of playing vote-bank politics, while also warning that the issue will "destroy" India's relationship with Bangladesh.
