Digital Desk: Former NRC State Coordinator and retired IAS officer from Assam, Hitesh Dev Sarma, has written a letter to the Chief Election Commissioner of India to include key verification methods from the National Register of Citizens (NRC) updation process into Assam's ongoing electoral roll revision.
In the letter, Hitesh Dev Sarma commended the decision of the Election Commission of India (ECI) to take up an intensive revision of the electoral roll in the state, particularly after the recent detection of foreign nationals in Bihar's voter list.
Mentioning his extensive experience, Mr. Sarma provided detailed suggestions for strengthening the voter verification process in Assam.
He said that Assam has been a state grappling with illegal immigration and complex citizenship issues for decades.
Proposing the adoption of the 'Family Tree Matching' method in his letter, the former NRC coordinator said that this technique involved gathering family data from all descendants of a legacy person and using software to match information across family trees.
Mr. Sarma added that much of the family tree data collected during the NRC process remains available with the NRC authority. He urged the ECI to seek access to this data with the Supreme Court's permission, as the whole exercise was conducted under the higher court's direct supervision.
Mr. Dev Sarma highlighted the citizenship cut-off date for Assam, which is March 25, 1971, established under Section 6A of the Citizenship Act.
He mentioned that illegal immigration from Bangladesh has continued since then. He also emphasized the difficulties of distinguishing immigrants from Indian citizens based on language, religion, or appearance.
Additionally, Dev Sarma expressed his joy following Vivek Joshi's appointment as one of the Commissioners of ECI, who has prior experience with the NRC exercise as the then Registrar General of India. Mr. Sarma added that Joshi's experience would bring valuable insights to the electoral roll revision process.
Mr. Hitesh Dev Sarma expressed optimism about receiving a positive response from the Chief Election Commissioner to his letter.
Retired IAS officer Hitesh Dev Sarma has a distinguished career. He served under ECI as ERO in the early part of his career from 1987 to 1994, followed by his tenure as Election Officer from 1996 to 2000, and DEO & RO from 2005 to 2007.
He also worked as an Election Observer during the 2019 Parliamentary election. He was involved in the updation of NRC, Assam as Executive Director from 2014 to 2017 and played a leading role in formulating the verification procedure of NRC.
He was appointed as State Coordinator for NRC Assam in December 2019 and held the position until his retirement in July 2022.
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