"While the entire country participates in the general election, I am unable to," she laments.

Ms. Das is among the 97,000 voters in the state who have been labeled "D" or "doubtful," barring them from voting due to questions surrounding their Indian citizenship.

Referred to as the D-voters list, this phenomenon is unique to Assam, where issues of migration and citizenship are significant political fault lines.

With a nearly 300km-long (187 miles) border shared with Bangladesh, Assam has experienced decades of migration from its neighboring country, driven by religious persecution and employment opportunities.

Local nationalist groups in Assam have raised concerns that this influx of immigrants threatens the region's cultural and ethnic demographics and places strain on its resources.

In 1985, the Indian government declared that individuals who entered Assam without proper documentation after 24 March 1971 would be considered foreigners.

In 1997, the Election Commission of India (EC), responsible for overseeing elections, updated its electoral rolls and identified approximately 300,000 individuals with doubtful citizenship status, marking them with a "D." The EC deployed its own officers to verify whether these individuals possessed the necessary documents to prove their citizenship.