About CAA and NRC

The Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 was introduced and passed by Lok Sabha on Dec 09, 2019 and by Rajya Sabha on Dec 11, 2019. It amended the Citizenship Act of 1955* by providing a path to Indian citizenship for illegal migrants of Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, and Christian religious minorities, who had fled persecution from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan before December 2014. It exempts certain areas in the North-East from this provision. In 2016, a Bill was introduced to amend the Citizenship Act, 1955. The Citizenship Act was amended in 1992, 2003, 2005 and 2015. In December 2003, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, led by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), passed the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2003 with far-reaching revisions of the Citizenship Act. The amendment also mandated the Government of India (GoI) to create and maintain a National Register of Citizens (NRC). The bill was passed in Lok Sabha with 311 MPs voting in favor and 80 against the bill whereas it was passed in Rajya Sabha with 125 votes in favor and 105 votes against it. The National Register of Citizens (NRC) is a registry of all legal citizens, whose construction and maintenance was mandated by the 2003 amendment of the Citizenship Act. Currently it is implemented only in Assam, but is expected to be implemented for the whole of India by September 2020.

The BJP restated its commitment to amend the Citizenship Act in its 2019 election campaign. After the elections, the BJP government drafted a bill addressing the concerns of northeastern states. It excluded Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura, Meghalaya and Manipur, except for non-tribal cities exempted under pre-existing regulations. It also excluded some tribal areas of Assam.

Exclusion of Communities:

·         Muslims from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan are not offered eligibility for citizenship under the new Act.

·         The Act does not mention the Hindu refugees from Sri Lanka.

·         The Act does not provide relief to Tibetan Buddhist refugees, as they remain refugees and do not have the right to acquire Indian nationality.

·         The Act does not address Rohingya Muslim refugees from Myanmar. The Indian government has already been deporting Rohingya refugees back to Myanmar.

*The Citizenship Act, 1955 regulates who may acquire Indian citizenship and on what grounds. 

** http://egazette.nic.in/WriteReadData/2019/214646.pdf