Washington: Crucial stipulations within the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), ratified this year, might contravene specific tenets of India’s Constitution, according to a report published by an autonomous research branch of the US Congress. The CAA, which alters India’s 1955 Citizenship Act, was enforced in March of the current year.
The CAA’s central clauses, which provide a pathway to citizenship for immigrants from three countries belonging to six religions, while omitting Muslims, might transgress certain Articles of the Indian Constitution, as highlighted in a succinct ‘In Focus’ publication by the Congressional Research Service (CRS). The CRS, an autonomous research division of the US Congress, produces reports on subjects of interest to Congressional members, aiding them in making informed decisions. These CRS reports are not deemed official expressions of the Congress’s views.
The Indian administration and other supporters of the CAA have asserted that its intent is purely humanitarian. India has also dismissed criticisms leveled against the CAA, maintaining that “vote-bank politics” should not shape opinions about a “commendable endeavor” to aid those in distress.
Critics of the legislation caution that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are pursuing a Hindu-majority, anti-Muslim agenda, which imperils India’s standing as an officially secular republic and breaches international human rights norms and commitments, the report delineated.
In conjunction with the Federal government’s plans for a National Register of Citizens (NRC), the CAA might jeopardize the rights of India’s substantial Muslim minority, comprising roughly 200 million individuals, as per the three-page report’s contentions.
The CRS report informs Congress members that a leading US diplomat for the region in 2019 expressed genuine apprehensions regarding India’s trajectory and that issues such as the CAA do not detract from India’s capacity… to align with us in endeavoring to advocate, once more, this unbounded and open Indo-Pacific.
Certain Congress members have expressed associated apprehensions, including in the 118th Congress, where House Resolution 542 would censure human rights breaches and infringements on international religious freedom in India, and Senate Resolution 424, which calls for a swift cessation to the oppression and violence against religious minorities and human rights defenders in India, urging New Delhi to amend discriminatory laws such as the CAA, the report detailed.
During an electoral rally in West Bengal, Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh defended the CAA and asserted that its implementation cannot be thwarted. According to Singh, the CAA is not designed to revoke anyone’s citizenship but rather is a statute for conferring Indian citizenship upon individuals displaced from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan on religious grounds.
The Center implemented the CAA in March, issuing the regulations four years after Parliament passed the law to expedite citizenship for undocumented non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan who arrived in India before December 31, 2014.
Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal has also underscored that “The CAA pertains to the granting of citizenship, not the revocation of citizenship. It addresses the predicament of statelessness, upholds human dignity, and advocates for human rights.” Jaiswal further contended that the legislation is an internal matter of India.