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FUTURE OF MUSLIMS UNDER INDIA’S CITIZENSHIP AMENDMENT ACT (CAA)

By Shahroo Malik

Research Associate

Edited by Najam Rafique

January 18, 2020

(Views expressed in the brief are those of the author, and do not represent those of ISSI)

On December 11, 2019, the Indian parliament passed the controversial Citizenship

Amendment Act (CAA) which allows persecuted minorities from Afghanistan,

Bangladesh and Pakistan who entered India before or on December 31, 2014, a

fast-track to Indian citizenship.

The law has conveniently excluded Muslims immigrants and only allows Hindus, Sikhs, Christians,

Jain, Buddhists and Zoroastrians to become Indian citizens. After stripping the Indian Occupied

Kashmir of its relative autonomy, the Hindu nationalist government of BJP has now passed another

controversial bill. CAA is another attempt of the BJP government to turn India into a Hindu state and

putting India’s secular credentials at stake more than ever. CAA is no surprise as BJP had long ago

made it part of its manifesto. While referring to Muslim immigrants from Bangladesh in a gathering

in April 2019, the BJP president Amit Shah stated, “A Bharatiya Janata Party government will pick up

infiltrators one by one and throw them into the Bay of Bengal.”1 All this shows the fascist policies

that the BJP government is following in order to further marginalize and disenfranchise Muslims

living in India.

Along with CAA, another controversial issue is the implementation of National Register for Citizens

(NRC). The Modi government has started the drive of collecting data under the NRC in which all

Indians are required to provide documents in order to prove their citizenship. NRC will thus facilitate

1 Ravi Agrawal and Kathryn Salam, “India Is Betraying Its Founding Fathers”, Foreign Policy, December 17,

2019, https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/12/17/india-citizenship-law-protests-narendra-modi-amit-shah-founding-fathers/

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IB Future of Muslims Under India’s Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) January 18, 2020

the implementation of CAA. NRC was first tested in the Assam state of India which resulted in the

exclusion of about 1.9 million people out of the state’s 33 million population who have become

stateless overnight.2 A sizeable number of persons excluded from the NRC are Muslims who are

being sent to detention centers. The Home Minister, Amit Shah has announced that this drive will be

carried out across the country.

In the aftermath of the passing of controversial bill, thousands of protestors from all across the

country; Delhi, Assam, Mumbai, Guwahati, Calcutta, Hyderabad and Chennai came out on the

streets to voice their opposition against the CAA and NRC. At least 25 people have been killed in

protests across India,3 and around 5,500 people in Utter Pradesh alone have been seized by the

police.4The police also stormed the campus of Jamia MilliaIslamia University in New Delhi and

Aligarh Muslim University giving rise to a fresh round of demonstrations. Consequently, internet and

metro train and bus services were suspended in various parts of the country. Section 144 was also

imposed in Utter Pradesh which bans the assembly of more than four people. The Kerala Assembly

has recently passed a resolution demanding withdrawal of CAA and many other states have also

stated that they will not implement this contentious law.

It is pertinent to note that the protests that are being carried out across India have several

dimensions. The people of Assam are worried that immigrants from Bangladesh would put a burden

on the existing resources of the state and change the demography, language and culture of the

state. On the other hand, the Muslim immigrants from Bangladesh are protesting because they fear

deportation. Moreover, a majority of the protestors believe that the CAA is against the secular

principles of the Indian constitution and is a direct violation of Article 14 of the Indian Constitution

which guarantees the right to equality. The Muslim population in India believes that this is a

deliberate attempt by Modi to marginalize the Muslim community. Many people have appealed

against CAA and the Indian Supreme Court will start hearing the pleas from January 22.

The space for dissent in once secular India is now rapidly shrinking. Recently, a mob of masked men

associated with the BJP’s student wing, Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) attacked

Jawaharlal Nehru University’s (JNU) students, teachers and damaged the campus property. JNU is

2 “The world’s largest democracy is pushing back. Modi should listen”, Washington Post, December 23,

2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/indias-protests-should-be-regarded-as-a-moment-of-truth-for-modi/2019/12/23/1bde8eac-25af-11ea-ad73-2fd294520e97_story.html

3 “India citizenship law: 100,0000 attend Hyderabad protest”, Guardian, January 04, 2020,

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jan/04/india-hyderabad-protest-against-citizenship-law 4 Niha Masih, “India’s Muslims and activists face mass arrests, beatings amid unrest over citizenship law”,

Washington Post, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/indias-muslims-and-activists-face-mass-arrests-beatings-amid-citizenship-law-unrest/2019/12/27/7fd35918-2868-11ea-9cc9-e19cfbc87e51_story.html

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IB Future of Muslims Under India’s Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) January 18, 2020

famous for its left-wing activism and whose students and alumni were seen actively participating in

the protests against CAA. Leaders of the JNU student union who openly criticized Modi

government’s policies have also been charged with sedition cases in the past.

CAA is part of a series of actions taken by the BJP government to further suppress the Muslims and

its desire to transform India in to a Hindu majoritarian state. Earlier, on August 5, 2019 the BJP

government stripped away the autonomy of the Indian Occupied Kashmir; India’s only Muslim

majority state. The Kashmir Valley is under lockdown since August 5 and the Kashmiri people are

being inflicted by severe forms of torture and human rights violations. This move was then followed

by the Indian Supreme Court’s decision of allowing Hindus to construct a temple at the site of the

16th Century Babri Mosque, further questioning the rights of minorities in India.

Indian Muslims are being consciously marginalized by the BJP government. Their homes are being

raided at nights; protestors are being arrested and beaten by the police. NRC has made thousands of

Muslims immigrants stateless. All these actions have given rise to a sense of insecurity and fear

among Muslim community who are worried about their future. As the BJP is rapidly transforming

India into a homogenous Hindu state the space for minorities and especially, Muslims is shrinking

day by day. Their basic human rights such as religious freedom are being violated. Out of India’s 1.35

billion population, Muslims account for more than 200 million. Hence, despite the fact that Muslims

are a minority in India, 200 million is still a large figure which cannot be silenced easily. They have

now started to voice their concerns in the form of protests across the country. The BJP government

is trying to divide the Indian population along communal line in order to divert attention from more

serious issues such as economic slowdown and rising unemployment. If the BJP government

continues with its fascist policies and crackdown on dissent then it’s most likely that its domestic

situation will further deteriorate and may give rise to communal violence.