STATELESSNESS AND CITIZENSHIP IN INDIA: RECONCILING CAA-NRC DIRECTIVES WITH GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS NORMS

The Indian law is faced with the necessity to distinguish between formal non-citizenship, disputed nationality, documentary exclusion and legal statelessness in citizenship administration. This Article will explore that distinction by analysing the constitutional scheme of Articles 5-11 of the Constitution, the Citizenship Act 1955, the Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019, the Assam National Register of Citizens and the statutory framework for a National Register of Indian Citizens (NRIC) and the current foreigner law. It uses a doctrinal approach, Supreme Court decisions, official records, scholarship, and International Human Rights instruments to support its approach. The analysis reveals that the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 and citizenship verification systems are two distinct legal mechanisms and hence, should not be examined as a single legal programme. It also determines that the lack of inclusion in a citizenship register is, in and of itself, not a testament to statelessness, but that gaps in documentation and adjudication can nevertheless lead to a nationality limbo and to statelessness. Material evidentiary bases, the principle of procedural fairness and judicial review have gained new relevance in the context of nationality disputes recently, with the constitutional challenge against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 still pending. International standards provide binding guarantees in some human rights treaties and provide persuasive guidelines in conventions to which India is not a party related to statelessness. In it, the author suggests the technical adoption of an "individual determination" constitutional statelessness prevention framework that is accompanied by a reasoned process, effective review, child-sensitive protections, and a separate determination of whether another State recognises the individual as its national.