Till now the Supreme Court has not ruled on the matter. The Citizenship Amendment Bill 2019 provides for fast-track naturalisation for non-Muslim religious minorities from the three neighboring Muslim-majority countries of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Bangladesh if they arrived in India before 31.12. 2014 and have been here for five years.
Parliament passed the Citizenship Amendment Bill 2019 on 11 December 2019.
Key points of the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019
- The Act seeks to grant citizenship to persons belonging to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian communities who migrated to India after facing persecution on the ground of religion in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.
- The act aims to protect these people from proceedings of illegal migration.
- The cut-off date for granting citizenship is December 31, 2014. That means the applicant should have entered India on or before that date.
- The main objective of the Act is to grant fast track Indian citizenship in six years. In India, citizenship by naturalisation usuallytakes 12 years as per the Citizenship Act, 1955.
Controversies and Clarifications
Citizenship Amendment Act 2019
The Citizenship Amendment Bill 2019 led to widespread protests across the country, especially from North-east countries.
- The opposition argued that granting citizenship to all the minority communities in those countries except Muslims is a violation of the ‘Right to equality’ under Article 14.
The Home Minister clarified that “Muslims are not included because they do not face religious persecution in these Islamic countries.”
- Granting citizenship to refugees in North-east would affect the linguistic, cultural and social identity of the state. The Home Minister said:
The provisions of the amendments would not apply to tribal areas of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram or Tripura as included in the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution and the area covered under ‘The Inner Line’ (Manipur) notified under the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873.
Similarly, the Minister clarified it would not affect the linguistic, cultural and social identity and the rights of the people of Sikkim also.
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