Nearly two million long-time residents of Assam may soon bedeemed stateless, the United States Commission for International ReligiousFreedom (USCIRF) said on Tuesday as it expressed concerns over the NRCexercise. It further alleged that the residents are being stripped of theircitizenship "without a fair, transparent, and well-regulated"process. In a report on the religious freedom implications of the NationalRegister of Citizens (NRC), the USCIRF said 1.9 million names of residents ofAssam have been left off the updated list and expressed concerns about how theexercise is being used to target and disenfranchise the Muslim population.

"Close to two million long-time residents of Assam maysoon be deemed stateless. They are being stripped of their citizenship withouta fair, transparent, and well-regulated NRC process," said USCIRFcommissioner Anurima Bhargava, who testified before a congressional commissionon the issue last week."Worse yet is that Indian political officials haverepeatedly conveyed their intent to direct and use the NRC process to isolateand push out Muslims in Assam. And now, across India, political leaders areseeking to expand the NRC and implement different citizenship standards forMuslims altogether," Bhargava said.

USCIRF chair Tony Perkins said the updated NRC andsubsequent actions of the Indian government are essentially creating "areligious test for citizenship" to target the vulnerable Muslim community,and urged the Indian government to protect the rights of all of its religiousminorities as enshrined in the Constitution.In its 2019 Annual Report, theUSCIRF classified India as a “Tier 2” country for engaging in or toleratingreligious freedom violations that meet at least one of the elements of the“systematic, ongoing, egregious” standard for designation as a “country ofparticular concern,” or CPC, under the International Religious Freedom Act.

The India chapter of the report expressed concern that theNRC is “an intentional effort to discriminate and/or has the effect ofdiscriminating against Muslims.”