The data related to Assam’s National Register of Citizens (NRC) disappeared from its official website, it was reported by news agency PTI on Tuesday. The final list was published on August 31, 2019 and did not have names of over 19 lakh people.
This first came to light on Tuesday although some officials quoted in various reports have said that the data was unavailable from December 15 as their contract with the technology partner Wipro ended on October 19 last year. After the fact became public and caused panic, the Centre on Wednesday issued a notice assuring the people that the data is safe and cited “some technical issue in visibility on cloud”. Authorities have said that the matter is “being resolved soon”.
A Times of India report quoted an official saying that, “The service period of the cloud storage provided by Wipro expired and the subscription renewal was not done as there was no coordinator after the transfer of the former coordinator Prateek Hajela”.
The disappearance of data created panic among people as without the names available to them, they could not be issued the rejection certificate which is required to file an application for citizenship.
The opposition in the state has written to the Registrar General of India alleging “malafide intent” and urged for the matter to be looked into. Opposition leader Debabrata Saikia wrote, “It is a mystery as to why the online data should vanish all of a sudden, especially as the appeals process has not even started due to the go-slow attitude adopted by the NRC Authority.” The final NRC list of Assam has not yet been notified officially by the Registrar General of India.
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