New Delhi, Oct. 3 -- Seven years after Assam's National Register of Citizens (NRC) excluded 1.9 million people, the Centre has told the Supreme Court that the process of issuing rejection slips to them has not even begun because the final NRC is yet to be formally notified. The disclosure means that people left out of NRC published on August 31, 2019 are still without the formal rejection document that would tell them the reasons for their exclusion and enable them to pursue statutory remedy before foreigners tribunals. In an affidavit filed on September 28, the Registrar General of India (RGI) told a bench of justices PS Narasimha and Alok Aradhe that the state NRC coordinator was still working on a "security regime" for preserving the NRC data. The data has not yet been handed over to RGI, which can notify the final NRC only after receiving it. RGI further said that the process of issuing rejection slips "has not been started yet" by the state NRC coordinator. The Supreme Court had specifically directed the state NRC coordinator on May 8, 2018 to develop a mechanism for issuing rejection slips to people excluded from the final list so that they could challenge their exclusion before foreigners tribunals. The state NRC coordinator informed RGI in October 2020 that rejection slips could be issued only after RGI notified the final NRC. That notification, however, is still awaited. The matter will be heard again on November 6....