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ImpactofNRC.Rmd
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# **Impact of NRC, NPR and CAA**
Renke commission clearly mentions that DNT communities lag the citizenry rights, which can be only claimed through various kinds of documentation which DNT communities do not have! "Poverty and lack of citizenry rights deny them access to basic rights. Though free primary education to every citizen is a constitutional right, as Tilak observed, 'There is nothing like 'free' education in India' (2007: 262, in Abusaleh Shariff and Maitreyi Krishnaraj, eds., State, Markets and Inequalities, Orient Longman, New Delhi). In fact, he further pointed out that 'Low income groups spend a higher proportion of their income on education than the rich' (ibid: 263). In the case of a Denotified and Nomadic population it is not the question of low-income but a question of no-income." ([Renke 2008:84](about:blank))
lack of marriage certificate - migration, disaster etc the reasons but with this lack of register marriages or registration of marriage after traditional marriage is not in practice
Practice of changing names after marriage will affect one to prove their relationship with their maternal/paternal families. This becomes even more difficult as on the one hand the government accepts the problem and still, on the other hand, asks to prove the legacy relationship establishing her relationship to her mother or father and her grandmother or grandfather. For the same, the documents asked in the NRC are similar to the documents asked in List A and List B.
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### **Brief timeline of events leading to the updating of the Assam NRC**
- 1951: First-ever National Register of Citizens (NRC) of India published.
- 1979: Anti-foreigners' movement started in Assam.
- January 1980: All Assam Students Union (AASU) submitted the first memorandum demanding to update of NRC.
- August 14, 1985: Historic Assam Accord was signed.
- 1990: AASU submitted modalities to update NRC to Centre as well as state government.
- 1999: Centre took the first formal decision to update the NRC as per the Assam Accord.
- May 2005: The then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh chaired a tripartite meeting between the Centre, Assam government and the AASU where an understanding was reached that steps must be taken towards updating the NRC to fulfil the promises made in the Assam Accord. " "The modalities for this were approved by the Centre in consultation with the Assam government.
- July 2009: An NGO called Assam Public Works moved the Supreme Court pleading that the names of those migrants who have not been documented should be removed from the voters' list. The NGO requested the court that the process to update the NRC should be started. This is the first instance of how the NRC matter reached the Supreme Court.
- August 2013: The petition filed by Assam Public Works came up for hearing.
- December 2013: The Supreme Court directed that the exercise to update NRC should start.
- February 2015: Though the Supreme Court had ordered updating the NRC in 2013 to identify bonafide citizens and weed out illegal immigrants, the actual exercise began in February 2015. "
- December 31, 2015: Deadline set by the Supreme Court to publish the NRC was missed and since then the apex court has been constantly monitoring the update
- December 31, 2017: The government published the first draft of the NRC.
- July 30, 2018: Assam government releases second NRC draft. Of the 3.29 crores who applied, 2.89 crores were declared genuine citizens. The draft NRC excluded over 40 lakh people.
- August 1, 2018: The Supreme Court ruled that the Assam NRC was only a draft, and hence it cannot be the basis of any action by any authority against anyone. The Chief Election Commissioner O.P. Rawat clarified that the electoral roll is governed by a separate law and exclusion from the final NRC would not mean "automatic removal" from Assam's voters' list.
- August 17, 2018: The Supreme Court asked the Assam NRC coordinator to submit the data of the district-wise percentage of the population excluded from the NRC draft in the state. "
- September 5, 2018: The Supreme court had ordered that any one of the 10 of a total 15 documents provided in List-A of the NRC claim form can be used by the claimants to prove legacy.
- December 31, 2018: This was the deadline for the government to release the final version of NRC. However, the deadline could not be met.
- September 5, 2018: The Supreme court had ordered that any one of the 10 of a total 15 documents provided in List-A of the NRC claim form can be used by the claimants to prove legacy.
- December 31, 2018: This was the deadline for the government to release the final version of NRC. However, the deadline could not be met.
- June 26, 2019: An additional draft on exclusion list was published. This list had 1,02,462 names, taking the total number of those left out to 41,10,169. "
- June 26, 2019: An additional draft on exclusion list was published. This list had 1,02,462 names, taking the total number of those left out to 41,10,169.
Evident from the chart that information asymmetry that Nomadic communities in India face with regard to something which, is constantly given violent colours against the Muslim community. 62% of those who know something about NRC or CAA do not know it in actuality. 33% dosen't even the anything about the NRC or CAA both for which the BJP and RSS is trying to creat a monster out of Muslim community. Only 5% from the survey know anything at all about NRC and CAA. It is no surprise for a community to not have information about some of the biggest legislations or laws in a country in which they are historically marginalised and tossed from place to place.
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#### **Own House**
No house, no permanent address proof which is required for NRC
#### **Whether Staying at the present place/address since birth**
#### Possess Documents Mentioned in List A and B of NRC Assam Exercise
The most important question of our survey returned with information which even we were not expecting for the Nomadic communities living nearby large metropolises such as Mumbai. 100 percent of the respondents surveyed said that they do not have documents mentioned. We thought there might be some issue with the communication of the field researchers but on proper verification we found out that none of the surveyed individuals had documents asked in the list A and B of NRC exercise in Assam from or upto midnight of 24th March, 1971. However, it should not be mistaken that communities do not have the documents asked in the list A and B of the NRC, but those documents are produced in last few years. For example, the Bank accounts, Aadhar cars being the most prominent identities certificates among the communities.
##### **Reasons for not having Documents**
However, Ration card, Aadhaar cards and Bank accounts being the newest as per the dates mentioned on NRC documents. They do not go as far back as the date mentioned in the Assam NRC exercise, which is midnight of 24th March, 1971. Ration cards, bank account, Aadhaar card, PAN car being the majority identity certificates with the surveyed individuals. Majority of the bank accounts came into existence during the government scheme 'Jhan Dhan Yojana'. **"It's been so many years that I am still not able to get a Aadhaar card for my wife"** says Anand Namdev Kokre, a Pastoral Shepherd and a community leader and the founder of Mendpaputra Army. This is the situation of a person who is politically well aware of the importance of documentations but Bureaucratic indifference of India State makes it almost impossible for their family to have a piece of document.
add list A and B here
Beside the two Lists A and B mentioning in Assam NRC exercise there are two other documents mentioned for the women who migrated due to migration or marriage;
"(1) Circle Officer/GP Secretary Certificate in respect of married women migrating after marriage (can be of any year before or after 24th March (midnight) 1971), and (2) Ration Card issued up to the midnight of 24th March, 1971 can be adduced as supporting documents. However, these two documents shall be accepted only if accompanied by any one of the documents listed above (Government of Assam, 2020)."
Writing from here on Family trees impact on Women and Transgender.......
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#### **Possess document from List A and B asked in NRC exercise in Assam** (but not as per the date mentioned in NRC which is midnight of 24th March 1971)
#### **Know how to obtain any of the listed document mentioned in List A and B of NRC Assam survey.**
All of the charts above provide us with the clear information about the condition of the Nomadic Communities in India. On every developmental scale they are worse off than any other community in India. From education to the access to housing, every tangible and intangible asset doesn't exist with the Nomadic communities. When asked about the two basic questions on documents in Assam NRC exercise; none of from the survey to be found to have any document asked in both of the list A and B to possess mentioned documents. 66.7% percent those who participated in the survey are not sure if they possess any or all of the documents mentioned in Assam NRC list A and B. While 16.2% strictly don't know how to obtain documents mentioned in the NRC list A and B. Only 17.1% said that they know how to obtain documents mentioned in the Assam NRC list A and B.
Similarly, when we tried to know that do they know how to obtain those documents mentioned in Assam NRC list A and B? Not surprisingly, only 2% know how to obtain mentioned documents. 63% know 'little bit' which is to say that they know the place where to go for documents issued by the government. But does not know more than that, which is the main struggle a person faces in India, with indifferent and corruption riddled bureaucracy. 35% still do not know even that much information.
Nomadic communities face constant harassment of demolition of their settlements and eviction by the local revenue officials, municipal authorities, realtors, police, and the politicians. Such as in Jammu and Kashmir...the Gujjar Community is facing the constant harassment (links here of demolition drives)
"Housing is a basic human need. While a large number of Denotified Tribes are settled, Nomadic Tribes are generally on the move in pursuit of their traditional occupations for livelihood. Also, in view of the changing economic scenario, their age-old traditional occupations are gradually losing relevance in providing the desired livelihood support. The Nomadic Tribes are increasingly. Housing is an area where these communities face very serious problems. They do not have any record of rights (patta) for their residential plots, though they have been living in those areas for generations, be they in public or private land or waste lands; or on the roadside or in the fringe of the villages. They constantly live under these threats. Most of them live in small katcha houses (if we call them so) made of jute rags, polythene, or tin sheets, etc., without any sort of public amenities like safe drinking water supply, drainage, internal roads, etc.
"It has been seen that DNTs are living in slum conditions all over the country both in urban and rural areas. They live either in the open, small, and makeshift tents or in small hutments or improvised pucca or kachha houses. Not only the space occupied by such houses, etc., is far too inadequate in comparison to the size of their families but their settlements are virtually slums. During their visits to such settlements in some States, the Commission found that these settlements did not have the facility of common amenities like sanitation, clean drinking water, sewerage, electricity, roads, and public latrines, etc. The local body did not appear to have done anything in this regard." ([Renke 2008:117](about:blank))
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#### **Similarly the basic document such as Date of Birth**
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The social and economic achievements are one of the lowest for the nomadic and denotified communities in India. With only 32.4 % not knowing their place of birth and only 13.3% knowing their date of birth. Further 82.9% didn't have any kind of schooling while 59.6% of children were still not able to attend school. Date and place of birth is a crucial document for NRC....According to Professor Narayan Bhosale of the history department at Mumbai University, those people of the NT and DNT communities who are now 40 years old would also not be able to produce their parents' documents. And so, for a person in their 60s and 70s, it is categorically impossible to do so.
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Above data shows that 79% people do not have Date of birth certificate because they did not registered for the same because while practising nomadism nomadic women give birth to their children during migration, in the forest or at the outskirts of the villages which make it difficult for them to access government offices for birth registration and 15% people among the respondents are not aware of the existence of necessity of such registration. It is clear from this data that nomadic people will not be able to fulfil the condition of providing proof of birth on land of this nation.
These are causative factors since the deprivation of these groups is closely linked with the process of caste and ethnicity-based exclusion and discrimination [(Thorat, 2005)](https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?tbbLTk). A situation where the bureaucratic state is happy to show its indifference. All of this, not having a permanent address, living in tents, not able to get admission to school, not knowing the exact date of birth increases the vulnerability manifolds. In a country where the fetish of documentary evidence is the precursor to the establishment of individual identity. The Nomad is someone who doesn't fit in the Settled Society State's idea of Citizenship.
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It is also no surprise that only 29% say that there was any census conducted in their locality. It shows the neglect that Nomadic communities have been constantly facing for decades. When there is no survey, not even in the memory except for those who were criminalised for another process. The question arises that how come such a community must possess the tens of documents which the State is asking to prove Citizenship. To register for any kind of document one needs to be counted first. Will NRC and CAA exercise become the second exercise in 'Criminalisation' of all the Nomadic communities in independent India after the first time during the colonial government.
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