New Delhi: Reports say that the ruled under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) – under works ever since the Act was passed at the end of 2019 – are now ready and will be notified before the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
The CAA was passed in the Lok Sabha on December 10, 2019 and in the Rajya Sabha two days later after it was introduced in the upper house by Union home minister Amit Shah. The move drew heavy criticism from politicians and citizens alike for ostensibly singling out Muslims and excluding them from its purview.
The Act aims to provide citizenship to Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians purportedly fleeing persecution from India’s Muslim-majority neighbours; namely, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.
The notable absence of Muslims from the provisions of the legislation, irrespective of whether or not they are being persecuted in their countries, as well as the unconstitutional nature of the legislation when coupled with the National Register of Citizens (NRC), had drawn widespread protests from thousands of citizens across the country.
Despite the protests and violence that ensued, the government notified the law in January 2020. Yet, the rules have remained unwritten until now, four years later.
According to The Indian Express, the rules are now ready and an online portal to apply for citizenship under the CAA is also in place. “We are going to issue the rules for the CAA in the coming days. Once the rules are issued, the law can be implemented and those eligible can be granted Indian citizenship,” the newspaper quoted sources as saying.
“All things are in place and yes, they are likely to be implemented before the elections. The applicants will have to declare the year when they entered India without travel documents. No document will be sought from the applicants. Requests of the applicants, who had applied after 2014, will be converted as per the new rules,” these sources continued when asked about the timing.
The Economic Times reports that the deadline put in place in the original Act – which was limited to those who had come to India before December 31, 2014 – is likely to be extended.
Over the last few years, Bharatiya Janata Party leaders have brought up the CAA multiples times in rallies and promised that the Act will soon be functioning. Most recently, Shah said at a rally in West Bengal last week, “Didi (West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee) often misleads our refugee brothers regarding the CAA. Let me make it clear that the CAA is the law of the land and no one can stop it. Everybody is going to get citizenship. This is our party’s commitment.”
A bunch of petitions challenging the legal validity of the CAA are pending before the Supreme Court. In October, the Union government submitted an affidavit in the court defending the law and calling it a “benign piece of legislation”.