NRC Assam data 'vanishes'; MHA in damage control mode

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NRC Assam data 'vanishes'; MHA in damage control mode

MHA issued a clarification saying the Assam NRC data is not accessible due to some technical faults which will be resolved soon

Wednesday February 12, 2020 11:41 AM, ummid.com with inputs from Agencies

New Delhi: Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) Wednesday rushed into damage control after reports surfaced that the Assam National Register of Citizens (NRC) data has "vanished" and is not accessible on the computers.

MHA issued a clarification saying the Assam NRC data is not accessible due to some technical faults which will be resolved soon.

"The NRC data is safe. Some technical issues are in visibility on cloud. These are being resolved soon," news agency PTI quoted a home ministry spokesperson.

The Assam NRC data was released in August 2019. About 19 lakh people were left in the data who were unable to comply with the documents needed for inclusion in the Final NRC.

The National Register of Citizens (NRC) Assam was prepared as per the directives of the Supreme Court.

The reports regarding vanishing of the NRC Assam data from cloud came amidst widespread unrest and protest in entire India following Union Home Minister Amit Shah's repeated statement that the Modi government intended to implement the exercise at the national level.

The government however backtracked after the outrage, saying "as of now" there has not been any decision on it.

According to the reports, NRC Assam data was not available for a couple of days and it created panic in the public, mostly among the people excluded from the list as the rejection certificates were yet to be issued.

NRC State Coordinator Hitesh Dev Sarma accepted that the data has been made offline, but refuted the allegation of any "malafide" intent in it.

The cloud service for the huge set of data was provided by IT firm Wipro and their contract was till October 19 last year. However, this was not renewed by the previous coordinator.

"So, the data got offline from December 15 after it was suspended by Wipro", Sarma said.

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