Changes to India’s Citizenship Laws

Changes to India’s Citizenship Laws

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Updated April 18, 2024
Changes to India’s Citizenship Laws
Many in Congress have taken interest in human rights and
Muslims and later British colonialists. As a consequence,
religious freedom in India. In late 2019, India’s parliament
they have rejected the secularism propounded by founders
passed, and its president signed into law, the Citizenship
of the modern Indian state such as Jawaharlal Nehru and
Amendment Act (CAA), 2019, amending the country’s
Mohandas Gandhi. Many observers note that the CAA’s
1955 Citizenship Act. For the first time in independent
implementation came amidst the BJP’s second national
India’s history, a religious criterion was added to the
reelection campaign (voting begins in April 2024); some
country’s naturalization process. The changes sparked
view the timing as motivated largely by politics.
significant controversy, including large-scale and
sometimes violent protests. After a more than four-year
The Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019
hiatus, in March 2024 the government announced rules for
India’s Citizenship Act of 1955 prohibited illegal
CAA’s implementation, as India’s Supreme Court considers
immigrants from becoming citizens. Among numerous
multiple pleas to stay the controversial law. The Indian
amendments to the act since 1955, none contained a
government and other proponents of the CAA claim its
religious aspect. In 2015 and 2016, the Modi-BJP
aims are purely humanitarian. Opponents of the act warn
government issued notifications that Hindus, Sikhs, Jains,
that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu
Buddhists, Parsis (Zoroastrians), and Christians who came
nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are pursuing a
to India from Pakistan, Bangladesh, or Afghanistan before
Hindu majoritarian, anti-Muslim agenda that threatens
2015 would be exempted from laws prohibiting citizenship
India’s status as an officially secular republic and violates
for illegal immigrants. A Citizenship Amendment Bill
international human rights norms and obligations. In
meant to formalize these exemptions was introduced in
tandem with a National Register of Citizens (NRC) planned
2016 and—following resistance from opposition parties, as
by the federal government, the CAA may threaten the rights
well as street protests in India’s northeastern states—was
of India’s large Muslim minority of roughly 200 million.
passed and made law in December 2019, seven months
after a sweeping reelection that expanded the BJP’s Lok
Context: India’s Hindu Nationalist Government
Sabha majority and improved its standing in the Rajya
India’s population of 1.4 billion includes a Hindu majority
Sabha (upper house). The CAA’s key provisions—allowing
of about 80%, as well as a Muslim minority of above 14%
immigrants of six religions from three countries a path to
(see Figure 1). Prime Minister Modi, a self-avowed Hindu
citizenship while excluding Muslims—may violate certain
nationalist, took office in 2014 after his BJP won the first
Articles of the Indian Constitution (see text box).
outright majority in 30 years in the Lok Sabha (the lower
chamber of India’s bicameral legislature). That majority
Selected Articles of the Indian Constitution
was expanded in 2019 elections, providing an apparent
14. The State shall not deny to any person equality before the
mandate for pursuing long-held Hindu nationalist policy
law or the equal protection of the laws within the
goals. Among these were abrogation of Article 370 of the
territory of India.
Constitution, which provided special status to Jammu and
15. The State shall not discriminate against any citizen on
Kashmir, previously India’s only Muslim-majority state
grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth,
(announced in 2019 and validated by India’s Supreme
or any of them.
Court in late 2023), and construction of a Hindu temple at
the Ayodhya site of a historic mosque destroyed in 1992
India’s Home Ministry, which calls the CAA
(enabled by a 2019 Supreme Court ruling and
“compassionate and ameliorative legislation,” contends that
“consecrated” in early 2024).
the three specified countries have a state religion (Islam),
Figure 1. Religious Demographics in India, 2011
resulting in the persecution of religious minorities. CAA
advocates say that Muslims do not face persecution in
Pakistan, Bangladesh, or Afghanistan, and they insist the
act is constitutional because it addresses migrants rather
than citizens. Critics point out that migrants from other
neighboring countries with state (or favored) religions, such
as Sri Lanka (where Buddhism is “foremost” and Tamil
Hindus face persecution) and Burma (where Buddhism
enjoys primacy and Rohingya Muslims are persecuted), are
excluded from a path to citizenship. Persecuted Muslim
minority communities such as Pakistan’s

Shias and
Source: Census of India, 2011.
Ahmadis also enjoy no protections under the CAA.
Hindu nationalists tend to view India’s history as a series of
humiliations at the hands of foreign invaders—Mughal
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Changes to India’s Citizenship Laws
International Responses
several states abutting Bangladesh fear that naturalizing
The lead U.S. diplomat for the region in 2019 expressed
large numbers of Bengali immigrants will alter the region’s
“genuine concern” about “India’s trajectory” and that issues
culture and demographics, and threaten access to education,
such as the CAA “not detract from India’s ability ... to stand
jobs, and government subsidies. The government sought to
with us in trying to promote, again, this free and open Indo-
address these concerns by exempting certain tribal areas of
Pacific.” In 2022, the Biden Administration’s Ambassador-
six northeastern states from the CAA’s provisions.)
at-Large for International Religious Freedom raised
Large-scale and sometimes violent protests also raged in
concerns about the CAA among signs of increasing and
often official repression of India’s religious minorities.
West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh, as well as in Delhi. Mass

Upon the CAA’s March 2024 implementation, a State
demonstrations took place at numerous, mostly Muslim-
majority universities. Indian leaders were unmoved by the
Department spokesperson reiterated U.S. concern and said
dissent. At a 2019 rally, Prime Minister Modi said that the
the act’s implementation would be “closely monitored.”
opposition protests confirmed for him that passage of the
(India’s External Affairs Ministry (EAM) called the U.S.
statement “
CAA was “1,000 percent correct.” By February 2020,
misplaced, misinformed and unwarranted.”)
unrest had spread to 14 states across India, with at least 80
Some Members of Congress have expressed related
people reportedly killed in related violence and 1,500
concerns, including in the 118th Congress, where H.Res.
arrested before protests subsided by March of that year.
542 would condemn human rights violations and violations
Human rights groups decried reports that police used
of international religious freedom in India, and S.Res. 424,
excessive force against demonstrators, and said internet
which seeks “a swift end to the persecution of, and violence
shutdowns were disproportionate and unnecessary.
against, religious minorities and human rights defenders in
India,” and which urges New Delhi to amend
The National Register of Citizens
“discriminatory” laws such as the CAA.
India’s 1951 NRC has not been updated despite a 2013
Supreme Court order compelling the federal and Assam
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom
governments to do so. In 2018, the BJP-led Assam
(USCIRF) expressed being “deeply troubled” by the CAA’s
government published an NRC draft that was criticized for
establishment of “a legal criterion for citizenship based on
seeking to oust the ethnic Bengali immigrant population
religion,” and it urged the U.S. government to consider
from the state. Facing an August 2019 deadline, all of
sanctions against Home Minister Amit Shah “and other
Assam’s roughly 33 million residents had to prove through
principal leadership.” (The EAM rejected USCIRF’s
documentation that they or their ancestors were Indian
criticism as “neither accurate nor warranted.”) Neighboring
citizens before March 25, 1971, when Bangladesh gained
Pakistan’s government condemned the CAA, and the
independence from Pakistan and large numbers of Bengalis
Organization of Islamic Cooperation expressed concerns
illegally crossed into India. The final citizenship list
about the law. The U.N. Human Rights Commission views
omitted about 1.9 million residents, nearly 6% of the state’s
the CAA as “fundamentally discriminatory in nature and in
population. Almost all of those omitted reportedly are
breach of India’s international human rights obligations.”
ethnic Bengalis, and about half are Muslims. These persons
London-based Amnesty International similarly argues that
have been required to appeal to quasi-judicial “Foreigner
the CAA is “a bigoted law that legitimizes discrimination
Tribunals” and risk being stripped of their citizenship.
on the basis of religion.” For many critics, the absence of
Many independent human rights organizations have
allowances for Muslim Shia, Ahmadis, and Rohingya, as
expressed concerns about the NRC. A group of U.N.
well as for Tamil Hindus, from neighboring countries belies
the government’s claims
experts warned that the NRC process “may exacerbate the
that the CAA’s sole purpose is to
xenophobic climate [in India] while fueling religious
protect persecuted religious minorities in the region.
intolerance and discrimination in the country.” The New
Domestic Indian Opposition and Street Protests
Delhi government, which has yet to implement the law
nationally, maintains that the NRC update is a fair and non-
Public opposition to the CAA appeared quickly across India
discriminatory process driven by the Supreme Court and
in late 2019 and early 2020. Numerous political figures and
does not impose a religious test or render any persons
parties denounced the act; the main opposition Congress
“stateless.” Home Minister Shah stated in 2019 that the
Party has accused the Modi government of using the CAA
for “
NRC would follow the CAA in order to “detect and deport
the sinister purpose of differentiating Indian citizenship
on religious grounds.”
every infiltrator from our motherland,” but he has more
The chief ministers of Kerala, West
recently declined to comment on the planned chronology.
Bengal, and Tamil Nadu have stated that they will not allow
CAA’s
Observers see the CAA and NRC as closely linked, with the
implementation in their respective states, although
former said to help protect non-Muslims excluded from the
many constitutional experts appear to reject the legal
latter. Critics contend that, with the CAA designed to
arguments undergirding such refusals.
protect only members of “approved” religions, others will
Violent protests broke out in the northeastern states of
have little recourse, thus forwarding alleged Modi-BJP
Assam and Tripura a day after the bill’s 2019 enactment,
efforts to undermine India’s secular ethos and establish
spurring the federal government to deploy thousands of
what one senior observer calls “an ethnic democracy that
troops, impose a curfew, and cut off communications in
equates the [Hindu] majoritarian community with the
much of Assam. (Opposition in Assam is driven in large
nation” and relegates others to second-class status.
part by perceptions that the CAA will nullify provisions of
the Assam Accord of 1985, which set March 1971 as the
K. Alan Kronstadt, Specialist in South Asian Affairs
cut-off date for “legal” migration. Indigenous groups in
IF11395
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Changes to India’s Citizenship Laws

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https://crsreports.congress.gov | IF11395 · VERSION 4 · UPDATED