India's problematic citizenship bill
The Indian government has followed up on its words and passed a bill in its lower house of parliament that would accord Indian citizenship to non-Muslims from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who have lived in India for six years, even if they are without any document.
We wonder what the compulsion was for India to adopt such a policy, and what such a move will really achieve. As it is, India has its own minority issues to contend with. And there is a raft of issues that the Indian government needs to address in this regard. We cannot guess what the purpose of this move is, but such a move will have a bearing on other South Asian countries by exacerbating the communal divide in the region.
We say with great unease that although the bill is not an open arms offer, one cannot overlook the fact that this policy may act as an indirect encouragement for the minorities of these three countries, and is likely to communalise South Asia as a whole. Not only that, it is India's character as a multi-religious, multi-cultural and multi-ethnic society that might suffer a dent, and its secular and inclusive character, which is already under severe stress, will be compromised.
Nobody can deny that the South Asian countries are confronted with minority issues, in greater or lesser degrees, and it is nowhere more acute than in India as record would show. And if India is really serious about solving the problems, it should engage the other countries in mutual discussions instead of taking such unilateral actions that might prove as much harmful for the region as for itself in the long run.
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