Citizenship in India Articles 5 – 11 – Citizenship Amendment Act

Part II of the Constitution of India deals with the Citizenship Rights of a resident of India. Citizenship is a status that a person enjoys when he is termed a legal member of a sovereign state.

Being a Citizen of a country bestows them with some of the rights that alien members do not enjoy at all. Being a citizen, grants one, with the right to vote, take advantage of the schemes of the government, and a lot more.

Let us look at a few articles in the Indian Constitution that talk about citizenship rights.

Citizenship in India ARTICLES 5-11

1. Article 5: Citizenship at the time of Commencement of the Constitution

This article talks about the citizenship of a person at the time of the Commencement of the constitution. It says that citizenship can only be granted to a person;

• Who was born in India
• Whose one of the parents were born in the country
• Or one that has been a part of the Indian territory for 5 years or more after the commencement of the constitution.

2. Article 6: Rights of Citizenship for a person who has migrated from Pakistan

This article says that any person who has migrated to India from the territory that is now included in Pakistan shall be deemed to be an Indian Citizen if ;

• Either of his parents or grandparents were born in Indian territory as defined in the Government of India Act 1935.
• i) If the person migrated to India before the 19th of July, 1948, and stayed in India thereafter.
  ii) If the person migrated to India after the 19th of July 1948, they need to be a registered citizen of India by an official appointed by the Government of the dominion of India on an application made by them thereof to such an officer before the commencement of the Constitution, provided that no person shall be so registered unless he has been a resident of India for at least 6 months immediately preceding the date of his application.

3. Article 7: Citizenship of migrants to Pakistan

This is the article that deals with the rights of citizens who migrated to Pakistan It says that any person who migrated to Pakistan after 1st March 1947, they shall not be considered as a citizen of India.

4. Article 8: Citizenship of certain people of Indian origin residing outside India

This article deals with the citizenship of any person who resides outside India, and the one whose neither one of the parents or grandparents were born in the Indian territory.

He can be a citizen of India if he has been registered as a citizen of the country by the diplomatic, or consular representative of India in the country in which he has been residing, after an application made by him.

5. Article 9: An Indian citizen voluntarily acquiring foreign citizenship

This article says that if any Indian citizen voluntarily applies for citizenship of another country then they will no longer be considered an Indian Citizen.

6. Article 10: Continuance of rights of citizenship

This article says that any person that has been a citizen of India under any of the previous articles of this part, shall continue to be a citizen of the country and need to adhere to any laws made by the parliament.

7. Article 11: Parliament to regulate the rights of citizenship by law

This act says that the parliament holds the right to terminate or grant citizenship to any citizen and also holds the right to make any provisions and amendments to the above articles regarding citizenship.

PIO Card – Person of Indian Origin Card

A person will be eligible for the PIO Card if he belongs to the Indian origin and is the resident of any country but Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal, or Afghanistan. Or if he has ever held an Indian passport, or is a spouse of an Indian.

OCI Card – Overseas Citizens of India Card

An OCI Card is for the foreign nationals who were eligible to become a citizen of the State before 26th January 1950. Here, the applications from the citizens of Pakistan and Bangladesh stand canceled.

However, due to the introduction of the Citizen Amendment Act, the citizenship of the OCI cardholders and the PIO cardholders will be replaced with a new Overseas Indian Card.

Who is an NRI?

NRI stands for Non Residential Indian. An NRI is referred to a person that has moved out of the country for the purpose of employment, business, or any other intention that states that he will stay outside India for 183 days or more in a financial year.

Also, since an NRI stands to be an Indian Citizen, therefore, he has been granted the right to vote. A bill has been passed in lok to grant a proxy voter to the NRI’s.

The bill aims to amend the Representation of People Act which is about the allocation of seats and delimitation of constituencies for elections, qualifications of voters, and preparation of electoral rolls.

PRAVASI BHARATIYA DIVAS

Pravasi Bharatiya Divas is also known as the NRI Day, which is celebrated on 9th January, every two years. The motive behind its celebration is to appreciate and acknowledge the contribution of the Overseas Indian community towards the development of the nation.

CITIZENSHIP AMENDMENT ACT (2016)

In 2019, the citizenship amendment Bill was passed by the Parliament. After receiving assent from the president of the country, it was termed as the Citizen Amendment Act. This act aims to amend the Citizenship Act of 1955.

The newly formed act says that all the Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis, and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, who entered India on or before December 31, 2014, will not be treated as illegal migrants.

This further means that Muslims of the country will either have to prove that they have been residing in India since or before 31st December 2014 or lose their citizenship.

Further, this act allows citizenship to the citizens by registering if they meet certain qualifications, which are –

• For a person who has resided in the country for a year and if either of his parents is a former Indian citizen.
• Must have resided in the country or have been in the service of the central government for at least 11 years.
• However, there is an exemption for Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis, and Christians and for them, the time period of 11 years has been reduced to 5 years, under the newly amended act.

Once a person is deemed to be the citizen of the country, any illegal proceedings against them, with respect to their illegal migration and citizenship shall be taken down.

It shall be noted that this act is not applicable to the tribal areas of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, and Tripura, which was included in the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution. Adding to this, this act will not apply to the “Inner Line” areas notified under the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873.

This permit system is applicable to Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, and Mizoram. Manipur was brought under the Inner Line Permit (ILP) regime under a Gazette Notification on the same day the bill was passed in the parliament.

CONCERNS AGAINST CAA

Though, the act was able to pass through the parliament but is not well received by the citizens of the country. As soon as the bill was approved and was termed as an act, the country saw an uproar from its citizens who stood against its discriminate nature.

Critics have argued that it is violative of Article 14 of the Constitution and also violated the principle of secularism that is enshrined in the Preamble to the Constitution of India.

It is also believed that India has several other refugees that include Tamils from Sri Lanka and Hindu Rohingya from Myanmar that are not covered under the Act.

This act tends to throw the light on the religious oppression that has happened and is happening in these three countries and thus, it may worsen our bilateral ties with those countries.

GOVERNMENT’S TAKE ON CAA

To be clear about our take on such decisions, it is important to lend an ear to both sides of the argument and to look at both sides of a coin.
Therefore, it is vital for one to hear the Government’s take on this, too.

The government says that Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh are Islamic republics where Muslims are in majority hence they cannot be treated as persecuted minorities.

It believes that this amendment in the act will come as a big boon to all those people who have been the victims of partition and the subsequent conversion of the three countries into theocratic Islamic republics.

Regarding the minorities from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, etc., the Government had clarified that the process of awarding citizenship to refugees has been undertaken by different Governments in the past years on a case by case basis from time to time, on “reasonable qualifications to Article 14”.

Conclusion

Finally we have seen the Citizenship in India tutorial. The citizenship of any country is granted on the basis of their frustrated terms and conditions in their constitution.

The Indian Constitution grants the parliament the right to amend the citizenship policy according to the needs of the country. However, doing so, one shall keep in mind other acts of the constitution and not be discriminative in nature.