Context

This editorial is based on the news “Citizenship Amendment Act rules notified, four years after the law was passed” which was published in the Hindu. Recently, the Ministry of Home Affairs notified the Citizenship Amendment Rules 2024 that would enable the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) passed by the Parliament in 2019.

About the Citizenship Amendment Rules 2024

• Citizenship Amendment Rules 2024 deals with: The Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 amended the Citizenship Act of 1955 allowing Indian citizenship for Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, and Christian religious minorities who fled from the neighboring Muslim majority countries of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan before December 2014 due to “religious persecution or fear of religious persecution”.
  • However, the Act excludes Muslims.
• Eligibility: Under Citizenship Amendment Act 2019, migrants who entered India by December 31, 2014, and had suffered “religious persecution or fear of religious persecution” in their country of origin, were made eligible for citizenship by the new law.
• Availability: These types of migrants will be granted fast track Indian citizenship in six years. The amendment also relaxed the residence requirement for naturalisation of these migrants from eleven years to five.
• Relaxations: Under the Citizenship Act, 1935, one of the requirements for citizenship by naturalisation is that the applicant must have resided in India during the last 12 months, as well as for 11 of the previous 14 years.
  • The amendment relaxes the second requirement from 11 years to 6 years as a specific condition for applicants belonging to these six religions, and the aforementioned three countries.
• On Illegal Migrants: Under the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019, an illegal migrant is a foreigner who:
  • Enters the country without valid travel documents like a passport and visa, or
  • Enters with valid documents, but stays beyond the permitted time period.
• Exemptions: It exempts the members of the six communities from any criminal case under the Foreigners Act, 1946 and the Passport Act, 1920. The two Acts specify punishment for entering the country illegally and staying here on expired visas and permits.
• On Sixth Schedule: The provisions of the Act will not apply to the tribal areas of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram or Tripura as included in the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution and States of Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Nagaland that are protected by the Inner Line Permit (ILP). 
  • Later, Manipur was added to the list of exempted States. 
  • This means that those “illegal” migrants who will be deemed Indian citizens through the Act will not be able to settle down in the exempted areas.

Government’s Stand on Citizenship Amendment Act 2019

• Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 does not discriminate on the basis of religion but provides relief to persecuted minorities.
• It addresses the plight of the minorities affected by Partition. 
  • In its affidavit, the government has argued that under the 1950 Nehru-Liaquat Pact, India and Pakistan had promised “complete equality of citizenship” and “a full sense of security” to their religious minorities.
  • The failure of Pakistan and by extension today’s Bangladesh to honour this promise justifies targeting relief to non-Muslim refugees from these two countries.
• The CAA is “compassionate and ameliorative” and does not deprive any Indian of citizenship.
  • The Citizenship Act, 1955 is very much operational and does not amend or alter this legal position in any manner whatsoever.
  • Hence, legal migrants of any religion from any country will continue to get Indian citizenship once they fulfill the eligibility conditions already provided in the law for registration or naturalisation.
• The CAA does not affect the protection granted by the Constitution to indigenous population of northeastern states.
• It aims to grant citizenship to minorities who have faced religious persecution in Muslim- majority foreign countries.

Criticisms of the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019

• Targeting Muslims: The protesters claimed that the law violates the Constitution as it aims to grant Indian citizenship on the basis of religion – barring Muslims.
• Against Right to Equality: Critics argue that it is violative of Article 14 of the Constitution, which guarantees the right to equality.
• A Threat to Culture: The prospect of citizenship for massive numbers of illegal Bangladeshi migrants has triggered deep anxieties, including fears of demographic change, loss of livelihood opportunities, and erosion of the indigenous culture.
• Further Challenge: It is also unclear if Muslim immigrants would qualify under the CAA if they convert to Hinduism.
  • It also does not define “persecution” or provide meaningful guidance about what beneficiaries will need to prove beyond their religious identity.

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