Healing old wounds | The Indian Express

Healing old wounds | The Indian Express

Written by Divyansh Dev |Published: July 16, 2019 12:19:51 am

Divyansh Dev is a practicing advocate at Delhi High Court. He is also United Nations Global School Ambassador from India. Views are personal

Healing old wounds

NRC process addresses a century-long demographic crisis in Assam.

The reasons behind NRC are same, as are the aspirations of the people whose will mandates it.

As the July 31 deadline for the Supreme Court-monitored NRC (National Register of Citizens) in Assam approaches, the faultlines in the discourse around it have widened. Some of the descriptions of the exercise ignore how its history dates back a century, and how that history continues to mould the present. The basic issue of weeding out infiltrators and preserving racial and ethnic identity is being drowned by confused concerns over the rights of refugees and a religious exodus. These accusations are false: The NRC refuses to touch refugees and only filters the infiltrators that have secured access to the state’s resources purely as a vote-bank. Given the exercise is Supreme Court monitored — the Court is ultimate guarantor of fundamental rights — any misgivings about a Rohingya-like situation in Assam must be ignored.