NEW DELHI: While the publication of draft National Register of Citizens NRC ) for Assam on December 31 midnight will be as per instructions of the Supreme Court , the move is politically significant in a state where citizenship and the issue of illegal migrants has marked a political fault-line.The NRC is significant for BJP that framed the poll discourse in terms of protecting Assam's identity from dilution due to illegal migration, a move that helped it win the 2016 election handsomely.The NRC will help it act on its promise of delineating genuine citizens in Assam and use the register as a means of deciding who is eligible to state benefits and, of course, voting.In fact, identification of illegal migrants into Assam - mostly Bangladeshis who came in after 1971 - was a key poll plank on which BJP fought as it accused rival Congress of nurturing vote banks. The role of illegals who vote in elections in Assam may be curtailed, even if the NRC process will take some time, and limit the utility of the card in the forthcoming elections.The draft NRC will establish Indian citizens resident in Assam and exclude those with 'foreigner' status. "This will ensure greater share for regular Assamese citizens in government benefits and subsidies, while denying 'squatters' rights and services they enjoy due to non-questioning of their citizenship status by the erstwhile governments, largely as part of political considerations," said a political analyst.Though there is no authentic count of Bangladeshi immigrants residing in Assam, unverified estimates, including one put out by the home ministry in reply to a Parliament question in 2016, puts the number at around 2 crore.

Source: Times of India December 31, 2017 00:22 UTC