Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019: An Analysis

The current media is flooded with different viewpoints regarding CAA. Some of them are of the view that the Act itself is against a particular community. At the same time, some are of the opinion that the Act is a good initiative by the government as it provides citizenship to people who were categorised as ‘illegal migrants’ before.

Citizenship (Amendment) Bill was proposed in 2016 in the Lok Sabha and after almost 3 years, it got majority and subsequently with the assent of the President on 12th December 2019, it became an Act. This Act is the 5th amendment to the provisions of Citizenship Act, 1955 after the amendments in the years 1986, 1992, 2003 and 2005. This amendment was proposed due to the migration of a large number of people during the days of partition. Part II (Articles 5 to 11) of the Constitution of India dictates the criteria for citizenship. Article 11 of the Constitution says,

‘Nothing in the foregoing provisions of this Part shall derogate from the power of Parliament to make any provision with respect to the acquisition and termination of citizenship and all other matters relating to citizenship[1]

Citizenship Act, 1955 deals with acquisition, termination, and other aspects of Citizenship in India. Section 9(2) of the Citizenship Act says that the citizenship of any person is to be determined by the authority, and in India, the questions related to citizenship status are determined by the Central Government.

Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 was introduced to make some changes in favour of the people of six communities who were referred to as ‘illegal migrants’. The Act has relaxed the conditions on which they can get citizenship. To make the conditions liberal, the first significant change which made is in the definition of ‘illegal migrants’. Section 2(b) of the Citizenship Act, 1955 defines ‘illegal migrants’ as:

a foreigner who has entered into India—

(i) without a valid passport or other travel documents and such other document or authority as may be prescribed by or under any law in that behalf; or (ii) with a valid passport or other travel documents and such other document or authority as may be prescribed by or under any law in that behalf but remains therein beyond the permitted period of time.[2]

Section 2 of Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 has added a proviso to the above section according to which, now no person will be termed as ‘illegal migrant’ if the person has entered India on or before 31st December 2014 from Pakistan, Afghanistan or Bangladesh and the person belongs to one of the six communities which are Hindu, Sikh, Parsi, Buddhist, Jain or Christian. Moreover, a condition by which any person can obtain the citizenship of India by naturalisation has been liberalised. The Third Schedule of Citizenship Act, 1955, lays down the qualifications for the grant of citizenship by naturalisation.

Clause (d) of the Schedule reads as follows:

The qualifications for naturalisation of a person are that during the fourteen years immediately preceding the said period of twelve months, he has either resided in India or been in the service of a Government in India, or partly the one and partly the other, for periods amounting in the aggregate to not less than eleven years.[3]

CAA has added a proviso to the above clause which has decreased the number of years for which a person who has been in government service to be able to attain citizenship by naturalisation. According to the new amendment, for the person belonging to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian community in Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan, the aggregate period of residence or service of Government in India as required under this clause shall be read as "not less than five years" in place of "not less than eleven years".[4]

Section 3 of CAA says that it does 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" which covers Manipur, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland.

[Author Ritika Sharma is a student of UILS, Panjab University, Chandigarh]

[1].' India Const. Art. 11

[2] Citizenship Act, 1955, No. 57, Acts of Parliament, 1955(India)

[3] Supra note 2

[4] The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, No. 47, Acts of Parliament, 2019(India)