Recently, both Loksabha and Rajyasabha has passed the citizen Amendment Bill (CAB) 2019. The objective behind ammending this bill is to provide citizenship to the persicuted minorities from neighbouring islamic country i.e. Pakistan, Bangaladesh and Afganistan. Apart from this it also proposes to provide citizenship to the religious minorities of the said state such as Hindu, Muslim, Christians, Buddhist,Jain and Parsis who are already in India on or before 31st December 2014. It also can be noted that, the said states have also amended as islamic as state religion.
The bill will not applicable to “inner line of north-eastern states which states: “Nothing in this section shall apply to tribal areas of Assam as included in the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution and the area covered under ‘The Inter Line’ notified under the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873. The reason behind excluding the “inner line” is to protect the indeginious culture and population of the states. It simply means those who are staying in the notified area will not obtain the citizenship.
Whether CAB is unconstitutional?
The opposition has argued in Rajyasabha that CAB is unconstitutional by stating it’s violate article 14 of the Indian constitution. Article 14 says ” The state should not deny to any person equality before the law and equal protection of the law within the territory of India”. So the question is whether is CAB violating (a) Equality before the law and (b) Equal protection of the law. The simple means of the stated two aspect of Article 14 is Equality before the law in lay man understanding ” all people will be treated equally and will not be any discrimination” where as equal protection of the law in simple means ” reasonable classification of population which should be done in a reflexive lens of intelligible differentia and rational nexus”.
So the main argument is whether CAB is unconstitutional? No it is not because it fulfills the following criteria:
1. CAB has absolutely identified the religious minorities in three islamic states by looking at the situation of stated communities in that country.
2. Further government has the right to choose any country as per the requirement and situation that no one can question as the government has the sovereign right to choose whom to provide citizenship and whom to not.
If you further want to understand in details then let me tell you CAB is not violating because Article 14 itself states “a separate class of people can be created (non-Muslim immigrants in this case) by an enabling law”.
Whether CAB is discriminatory towards Muslims?
If you can think rationally then ofcourse it is not providing discriminatory actions towards muslims. The logical lens can be as follows:
1. First of all there is no discrimination towards muslims residing in India as CAB is not applicable to them because government is providing citizenship to the citizens of other countries.
2. The argument is why muslims only excluded in CAB, simply because this amendment is only applicable to three islamic counteries i.e. Bangladesh,Pakistan and Afghanistan as these countries were created by muslims and for the muslims. So the muslims who are residing in other countries (excluding the above stated countries) are eligible to apply for Indian citizenship.
The most important aspect of CAB is protest that is going on in North-east part of India especially in Assam and other parts of India as well. So the another clarification that need to be resolve.
Whether protest in Assam and other parts of India is same?
No, The protest in Assam is real where as excluding north-east the protest in other parts are seems like political move i.e. misguide people by creating fear in the name of CAB.
Why people of Assam are doing protest?
The situation in Assam is worst even you can able find student union and common citizen of the state are involve in this protest because they want to preserve their indeginious cultural identities, culture and language.
The fear of Assamese seems correct because they fear illegal Bengali Hindu migrants from neighbouring countries will destroy their indeginious cultural and linguistic identities. According to the linguistic data of the Census 2011, the percentage of people speaking Assamese decreased from 58 per cent in 1991 to 48 per cent in 2011, while Bengali speakers in the state went up from 22 per cent to 30 per cent in the same period.
The question is why the illegal migrant who will become the citizen of India in near future will only stay in Assam. Another concern is home minister should have given clarity that after getting citizenship where these migrants will go? the clarity should be based on where these illegal migrant will stay? and whether the government has planned to settle them somewhere?
No doubt it’s a good move by government but seems like the same move can alai destroy cultural identities for some group of people as well as directly it will affect some states like North-east, Assam,West-bengal and Odisha. After going through all the aspect the author fells the Citizen Ammendment Bill is just merely a political move which has introduced to gain vote in the near future as the election in West Bengal and Assam is coming very soon. Apart from this there was no need to pass this bill in hurrying, which clearly indicates CAB was passed and going to implement to gain votes and political gain.