{"id":307879,"date":"2019-01-08T12:01:02","date_gmt":"2019-01-08T12:01:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=307879"},"modified":"2019-01-08T12:01:02","modified_gmt":"2019-01-08T12:01:02","slug":"union-home-minister-rajnath-singh-introduces-the-citizenship-amendment-bill-in-lok-sabha","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/union-home-minister-rajnath-singh-introduces-the-citizenship-amendment-bill-in-lok-sabha\/","title":{"rendered":"Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh introduces \u2018the Citizenship Amendment Bill\u2019 in Lok Sabha"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday introduced the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2019 in Lok Sabha.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Bill seeks to facilitate acquisition of citizenship by six identified minority communities namely Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Christians and Parsis from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh who came to India before December 31, 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n

Moving the Bill, Rajnath clarified that the Act is not confined to the Assam state. The Bill will apply to all states and Union Territories of the country. The beneficiaries of Citizenship Amendment Bill can reside in any state of the country. The burden of these persecuted migrants will be shared by the whole country.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAssam alone would not have to bear the entire burden and Indian government is committed to give all help to the State Government and people of Assam,\u201d said Rajnath Singh.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Dispelling the misgivings about Citizenship Amendment Act, Rajnath highlighted the discrimination and religious persecution faced by these communities in these countries. They have no place to go to, except India, he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe Act will provide relief to persecuted migrants who have come through western borders of the country to States like Gujarat, Rajasthan, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh and other States,\u201d he added.<\/span><\/p>\n

Migrants from these communities were earlier given protection against legal action in years 2015 and 2016.<\/span><\/p>\n

The proposed amendment will make these persecuted migrants eligible to apply for citizenship.\u00a0 Citizenship will be given to them only after due scrutiny and recommendation of district authorities and the State Government.\u00a0The minimum residency period for citizenship is being reduced from existing 12 years under the present law to 7 years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rajnath said the Union Cabinet has also approved grant of ST status to Six Communities of Assam namely Tai Ahom, Koch Rajbongshi, Chutia, Tea Tribes, Moran and Matak.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cA Bill is being introduced in the current session of Parliament,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

He further added, \u201cfull safeguards will be provided to protect the interests, rights and privileges of existing Scheduled Tribes of Assam.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cA separate bill will be brought to grant ST status to Bodo Kacharis in Hill districts of Assam and Karbis in the rest of Assam,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSixth Schedule of the Constitution is also proposed to be amended to strengthen the Autonomous District Councils,\u201d Rajnath added.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday introduced the Citizenship Amendment Bill, 2019 in Lok Sabha. The Bill seeks to facilitate acquisition of citizenship by six identified minority communities namely Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Christians and Parsis from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh who came to India before December 31, 2014. Moving the Bill, Rajnath clarified […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":301134,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[36],"tags":[10535,406,2597],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307879"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307879"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307879\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":307880,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307879\/revisions\/307880"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/301134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}