Meghalaya HC accepts Assam DCs' apologies

The Meghalaya High Court today accepted the apologies by Assam's Kamrup Deputy Commissioners M Angamuthu and Vinod Sessan for failing to depose before it in the past despite notices issued to them in a case relating to issuance of citizenship certificates.
A division bench, comprising Chief Justice Uma Nath Singh and Justice T N K Singh, also accepted the affidavits filed by them with regard to a case relating to issuance of citizenship certificates of Bangladeshi citizens whose forefathers had come to reside in a village in Meghalaya along the inter-state border prior to 1971.
Deputy Commissioner of Kamrup(Metro) M Angamuthu and Vinod Sessan of Kamrupt Rural claimed in their affidavits that Assam had no records to produce before the court with regard to the case.

The bench has fixed August 11 as the next date of hearing in the case in which Meghalaya government, which dragged both the Deputy Commissioners to the court, will argue over the affidavits.
Last year, a single bench of the HC had ruled that Bangladeshi citizens who had come to reside in India prior to 1971 can claim citizenship based on a reported mutual understanding between both the countries.
The bench had also directed the Ri-Bhoi Deputy Commissioner to return all the citizenship certificates seized from a group of such individuals who are residing in a village along the interstate border.

Meghalaya government then filed a writ appeal stating that the records relating to issuance of citizenship certificates by the Kamrup DC are required.