Salient features of Citizenship (Amendment) Act [CAA]
Only a few days before, the Central Government has notified the CAA which was passed way back in 2019. Immediately thereafter, some leaders and intellectuals have started criticizing the Act. Some of them even said that whoever applies for citizenship under this Act, his/her citizenship will be cancelled and he/she will be thrown out of the country.As a common man with less-than-average intelligence, I got puzzled by the arguments of these leaders and intelligentsia opposing CAA. I tried to study a little bit to know about the salient features of this Act. Whateven I have found by my own study, has further puzzled me. What these leaders are saying has so semblance of relationship with the Act which has been notified.
The salient features of CAA are:
(a) The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 [CAA] enables migrants/foreigners of six minority communities from three specified countries who have come to India because of persecution on grounds of their religion to apply for Indian citizenship. It does not amend any existing legal provision which enables any foreigner of any class, religion, category, etc to apply for Indian citizenship through registration or naturalization modes. Such a foreigner has to become eligible to apply for citizenship after fulfilling the minimum legal requirements.
(b) The CAA does not apply to Indian citizens. It seeks to grant Indian citizenship to particular foreigners who have suffered persecution on grounds of their religion in three neighboring countries.
(c) The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill has been in the public domain since 2016. It was cleared by a 30-member Parliamentary Committee consisting of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members. The present Act is broadly based on the same Bill.
(d) By amending the appropriate rules during 2015-16 the Govt. of India had already legalized entry as well as the stay of such foreign migrants belonging to six minority communities from these three countries who had come into India up to December 2014 because of persecution on grounds of religion. The Government of India had made such migrants also eligible for grant of Long Term Visa (LTV) to stay in India for a long time. The CAA enables them to take Indian citizenship if they fulfill conditions/qualifications for such citizenship provided they migrated from these three countries before 31st December 2014.
(e) On separate occasions, special provisions had earlier been made by the Govt. of India in the past to accommodate the concerns of stay and citizenship of foreigners of Indian origin who had to flee to India. For example, Article 6 of The Constitution provides that a person who has migrated to India from Pakistan before 19th July 1948 shall be deemed to be an Indian citizen. Secondly, even if he/she has migrated on or after this date he was registered as an Indian citizen after staying for only six months in India. 4.61 lakh Tamils from Sri Lanka were given Indian citizenship during the years 1964-2008 after the signing of international agreements in 1964 and 1974 between two countries. About nienty-five thousand Sri Lankan refugees are living in Tamil Nadu. They are being given rations and other facilities by the Govt. of India and the Govt. of Tamil Nadu.
I would like to know the opinion of other members of ISC on this Act which has just now been notified. Do they feel what those leaders are saying factually correct?
Finally, three great chief ministers have announced that they would not allow implementation of CAA in their states. As far as my very limited knowledge goes, citizenship is included in the Union List of the Constitution. The states have absolutely no say in this regard. If that is so, how can these great leaders stop implementation of CAA in their states?
