The Indian law has defined an illegal migrant as a person who has entered our country without any valid documents or has stayed beyond the validity of their visa. The recent Citizenship Amendment Bill has been a bone of contention for many. This Bill says that all the Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Parsis and Christians from our neighbouring countries like Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan will not be considered as illegal immigrants.

 

To attain the citizenship of India, every person needs to undergo a process known as naturalisation. In this, the person either needs to reside in India or work with the Government of India for 11 years. What this Bill essentially proposes is to reduce this duration to six years. What people are overlooking is, they still must undergo that process. This Bill seeks to provide justice to all those who have been illegally thrown out of their countries.

Unfortunately, our Opposition as usual has been oblivious to the plight of the people in theocratic nations. We have already lost a lot of time, but this amendment is indeed a step in the right direction. These people have been thrown out of their countries just because of their religion.

As we are trying to save our country from destruction, we should also try to protect those who have been unfairly persecuted. Thus, we should first try to identify those who act as our enemies inside our country, who have never contributed to the progress of India but have always caused disruption. We should not fall into their traps of disruption to protect the culture of India.

This Citizenship Amendment Bill truly upholds the ethos of Vasudaiva Kutumbakam (the world is one family), which makes all those who are wrongly persecuted our own. We have seen this happening from ages with the Parsis and the Jews who have sought refuge in India after they were thrown out of their countries and now have been a part of India’s nation building process.

About Abhinav Khare

Abhinav Khare is the CEO of Asianet News Network and also the host of a daily show named Deep Dive with AK. He has a lifetime collection of books and gadgets and has already pinged more than hundred cities around the globe. 

He is a tech entrepreneur, who is passionate about policy, technology, economy and philosophy from ancient India. He earned an MS Engineering from the ETH Zurich and an MBA Finance from the London Business School.