NEW DELHI – Days before general elections in the country, India granted citizenship to 14 people under a controversial law that has been criticized for discriminating against Muslims.
The citizenship was awarded on Wednesday under the much-debated Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) that grants citizenship to Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, and Christians.
The law allows citizenship to people who fled to India from Muslim-majority Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan before Dec. 31, 2014, owing to religious persecution.
Though the law was enacted in 2019, it was not immediately implemented due to public outcry and sectarian violence in New Delhi and other parts of the country that resulted in multiple deaths.
Recently in March, the Narendra Modi regime implemented the act as India braces for elections which could welcome Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for a rare third consecutive term.
Modi and his party deny that the act is anti-Muslim though human rights activists and notable politicians like Shashi Tharoor have fired a broadside at the government for implementing the law.
As the citizenship was awarded, the recipients were administered the oath of allegiance, and their documents were verified; the home ministry did not reveal their identities.
Commenting on the development, Harish Kumar, a Hindu refugee from Pakistan living in Delhi for over a decade, said getting citizenship was like being reborn.
“If a person doesn’t have rights then what is the point, (now) we can go forward in education, jobs,” he was quoted as saying by ANI.
As far as the criticism is concerned, Modi and the BJP affirm that the citizenship law only makes it easy for non-Muslim refugees to get a dignified life and is meant to award citizenship. For Muslim refugees, their stance is that they can under regular rules governing citizenship.
