The Citizenship Act has been amended five times before (1986, 1992, 2003, 2005 and 2015) – three times under the Congress-led governments and twice under the BJP-led governments. Another amendment to the Citizenship Act has now been passed by Parliament under the Narendra Modi government. And, the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 has run into a controversy.
The Act
The Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 (CAA) has amended Section 2 of the Citizenship Act, 1955, which defines “illegal migrants” by adding a proviso – Section 2 (1)(b) – according to which any person belonging to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian communities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan, and who have been exempted by the Central Government under the Passport (Entry into India) Act, 1920 or the Foreigners Act, 1946, shall not be treated as “illegal migrant”. Further, any proceeding pending against such persons shall abate allowing them to be eligible to apply for citizenship by naturalisation, which is laid down under Section 6 of the 1955 Act.
The absence of the Muslim community from the proviso is conspicuous and was the subject of intense debate among parliamentarians in the past few days.
It does not automatically confer citizenship on a person from Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian community from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan. They have to apply for citizenship and possess the qualifications laid down under the Citizenship Act. The amendments will not affect a person who is already a citizen of India.
The Act also does not exclude Muslims as a whole, as Muslims, including from the three countries specified in the proviso, can become Indian citizens by following the procedure laid down in the act. The prohibition is only if they are “illegal migrants”: those who travel without valid passport and documents, or those with valid documents who stay in India beyond the permitted time period.
There are Muslim communities facing discrimination in Muslim majority countries, such as the Rohingya Muslims who are a persecuted community in Myanmar. The amendment disregards this by classifying Muslims as one homogenous group. Thus, Muslim illegal migrants, as a whole, are denied a benefit irrespective of whether they are persecuted in their home country or not.
Non-Muslim illegal migrants from other countries will not get the benefit of this exemption.
Opposition to the Act
The Citizenship Amendment Act is opposed by Opposition parties and many civil rights activists on the ground that it discriminates against Muslims. They say that such discrimination is unconstitutional under Article 14.
Rights under Article 14 are absolute. These two fundamental rights are not exclusive to the citizens of India but to “any person”. In this backdrop, the Opposition parties and activists have accused the BJP of signaling out the Muslims to further its “hidden agenda”.
Beyond the political arena, civil society and discerning citizenry have vehemently expressed their disagreement with the new national law. More than 720 jurists, writers, actors, activists and citizens had issued a statement against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill and the National Register of Citizens, describing these as “misguided” and, worse, “unconstitutional”.
Protests Against the Act
Even before Lok Sabha cleared the Bill, protesters, majority of them being students took to streets in Guwahati to rally against the Bill on 10 December 2019. Hundreds poured into the streets responding to a shut down call by the North East Student’s Organization. However, the protests went out of control when public infrastructures and vehicles were vandalized and the police resorted to baton charges and firing of teargas. Soon the Army was deployed to contain the situation and the nature of protests turned absolutely violent resulting in the killing of 2 people during firing by the security forces. This also resulted in the cancelation of the annual India-Japan Summit scheduled for 15-17 December 2019 in Guwahati. However, these agitations remained confined to the North East.
What changed the extend and the momentum of these protests to acquire a pan Indian character started in Jamia Milia Islamia (JMI) University, New Delhi.
Protesters took to violence in West Bengal which started on 13 December 2019. In Lucknow, students of Darul Uloom Nadwatul Seminary gathered in large numbers to protests but the police did not allow them to leave the campus.
Pinched by the brutal police action on students from Jamia and AMU, students from IIT-Madras, TISS, Mumbai, Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU), Hyderabad, Jadavpur University and different cities such as Chennai, Puducherry, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Varanasi, Kolkata and took to streets in solidarity on 16 December against CAA and brutal Police action inside Jamia campus.
Protests against the Act started as a student’s protests but in no time assumed a political character where political parties as well as people holding political offices participated in these protests.
The protests spread to Delhi University (DU), where students organized peaceful demonstrations and boycotted the semester exams.
Although, these protests started as a student’s protests but in no time it assumed a political character where political parties as well as people holding political offices participated in these protests. Mamata Banerjee addressed a rally in Kolkata, while in Delhi the congress organized Bharat Bachao rally to address a variety of issues including CAA. Meanwhile in Kerala, the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) joined hands with the opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) to protests against CAA. Protesters gathered in Mysore, Bangalore, Manglore, Thiruvanthapuram, Kochi, Chennai, Aurangabad and many more districts.
The protests acquiring a political nature robbed these protests of their original essence, innocence and purpose. These protests that were initially seen as dissenting voice of an empowered youth of the country would have greatly contributed to enhance India’s image as a well functioning democracy. Political party as catalysts to students resorting to violence cannot be denied.
CAA and NRC in Assam
Home minister Amit Shah claimed that this law had nothing to do with Indian Muslims or other Indian citizens. Oddly, in the same speech in the Lok Sabha, he promised a nationwide National Register of Citizens (NRC) and then attempted to defend the CAB in isolation of that announcement. The law is a perfect example of the maxim, post hoc ergo propter hoc (after it, therefore, because of it). The CAB follows an Assam NRC which backfired and was denounced by the BJP’s own state leadership. The government is yet to publish the religion-wise breakdown of those 1.9 million excluded, but the CAB (Section 6B) seeks to abate proceedings against the Hindus in that list (singling out only Muslims as migrants). The CAB is, thus, a twisted solution to a botched NRC in Assam, and also a pre-emptive precursor to the nationwide NRC, which Shah has declared to be an inevitability. If this nationwide NRC is as badly conducted as the Assam NRC (whose first list identified over four million as immigrants), it will have an error rate of over 50%. The CAB is, therefore, a pre-emptive remedy to save all (but the Muslims) who are left out, something deliberately ignored by this government.
The Implications
Though the amendment does not automatically confer citizenship to Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian community from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan, it removes the tag of “illegal migrant” which is a roadblock for acquiring citizenship by naturalisation.
Further, it also relaxes the condition to acquire citizenship by naturalisation. As per the current requirement, a person should have 11 years of residence in India or service of government in India. The amendment reduces this to a period of five years.
Muslim illegal migrants from these three countries cannot apply for citizenship and will continue to remain illegal migrants.
The number of Bangladeshis living illegally in India was put at 2 crore by Union minister Kiren Rijiju in the Rajya Sabha in 2016. He did not get into numbers for specific states.
Ever since India became independent there has been an uncontrolled inflow of illegal immigrants for a variety of reasons from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan — many in search of greener pastures while many others are fleeing from religious persecution. Illegal immigration into India is a punishable offence —as it is in every other country. However, when the number of such illegal immigrants is as huge as it is, prosecuting the offenders may not always practicable.
There are at present in different parts of India an unascertained number of such immigrants living as refugees — many are subject to exploitation as cheap labour in several establishments. These illegal immigrants consist of, among others, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians — all minorities in the specified Islamic countries; and also a large number of Muslims who could be safely presumed to have migrated for reasons other than religious persecution.
The Constitution of India specifies who are citizens of this country. It also recognises Parliament’s power to make laws relating to citizenship. Accordingly, the Citizenship Act of 1955 was enacted. That law has been amended several times to meet the needs of the time.
