Hearings for citizenship under CAA will soon be over, 23,000 certificates already issued: Suvendu Adhikari
State-level implementation data was shared showing that citizenship certificates under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019 have been issued to around 23,000 applicants out of approximately 2.30 lakh applications received in West Bengal
Processing directives were issued to district-level authorities to expedite disposal of the remaining pending applications
A separate state legislative measure was cleared providing for arrest in cases of assault on police personnel and for recovery of costs for damage to public property
The update indicated that the citizenship application hearing process in the state is expected to conclude in the near term
The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019
The CAA, 2019 amended the Citizenship Act, 1955 to provide an expedited path to Indian citizenship for specified religious minorities from three neighbouring countries, without altering the general citizenship framework for other applicants.
Key Details
- Amends: Section 2(1)(b) proviso of the Citizenship Act, 1955 — exempts specified persons from being treated as "illegal migrants"
- Eligible communities: Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians
- Eligible source countries: Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan
- Cutoff date: entry into India on or before 31 December 2014
- Naturalisation residency requirement relaxed for these applicants: from 11 years to 6 years (via amendment to the Third Schedule of the Citizenship Act, 1955)
- The CAA does not apply to areas covered under the Inner Line Permit regime (Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Nagaland) or the Sixth Schedule tribal areas
The certificates being issued in West Bengal are precisely the citizenship grants enabled by this 2019 amendment, extended to eligible applicants who meet the community, country-of-origin and cutoff-date criteria.
CAA Rules, 2024 — Application and Grant Mechanism
The CAA, 2019 could not be operationalised until implementing rules were notified nearly five years later, in March 2024, which prescribed the procedural machinery for scrutiny and grant of citizenship.
Key Details
- Notified: 11 March 2024, under the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024
- Applications are submitted electronically and route through a District Level Committee (DLC), headed by a Senior Superintendent/Superintendent of the Department of Posts, which verifies documents and administers the oath of allegiance
- Final scrutiny and grant is done by a state-level Empowered Committee (EC), chaired by the Director of Census Operations, with members from the Intelligence Bureau, Postal department, State/National Informatics Centre and Home Department
- Applicants must furnish proof of country of origin, religion, and date of entry into India
- Citizenship is conferred under Section 6B of the Citizenship Act, 1955 (inserted by the 2019 amendment), and successful applicants receive citizenship certificates
The 23,000 certificates already issued and the roughly 2.07 lakh applications still pending in West Bengal reflect the throughput of exactly this DLC-to-Empowered-Committee pipeline established under the 2024 Rules.
Modes of Acquiring Indian Citizenship — Citizenship Act, 1955
The Citizenship Act, 1955 (as amended) prescribes five ways of acquiring Indian citizenship, of which CAA-route naturalisation is a modified sixth pathway applicable only to the specified beneficiaries.
Key Details
- Citizenship by birth (Section 3), descent (Section 4), registration (Section 5), naturalisation (Section 6), and by incorporation of territory (Section 7)
- CAA-specific route: Section 6B, added by the 2019 amendment, provides citizenship by registration or naturalisation specifically for the six communities from the three named countries, with the relaxed 6-year residency requirement
- Article 5 to Article 11 of the Constitution deal with citizenship at the commencement of the Constitution; Article 11 empowers Parliament to regulate citizenship by law thereafter — the source of Parliament's power to enact the Citizenship Act, 1955 and its amendments including the CAA
The certificates being processed represent the practical exercise of Parliament's Article 11 power, channelled through the specific Section 6B naturalisation/registration route created for CAA-eligible applicants.
- CAA cutoff date for entry into India: on or before 31 December 2014
- Communities covered: Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, Christian
- Countries covered: Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan
- Relaxed naturalisation residency period under CAA: 6 years (down from the general 11 years)
- CAA Rules notified: 11 March 2024 (over four years after the Act's passage in December 2019)
- West Bengal figures cited: approximately 23,000 certificates issued out of about 2.30 lakh applications (roughly 2.07 lakh applications still pending)
- Citizenship grant provision: Section 6B, Citizenship Act, 1955 (inserted by the CAA, 2019)
- Constitutional basis for Parliament's citizenship law-making power: Article 11