Enemy Property: Govt moves Bill to replace ordinance

[Barun]

Govt moves Enemy Property Bill to replace ordinance 

Raj Kumar Ray and Deepak Joshi, Business Today.  March 08, 2016

New Delhi: In a major move to prevent transfer of enemy property and allows state appointed custodian to sell it off, the government on Tuesday introduced a Bill to amend retrospectively several provisions of the Enemy Property Act of 1968.

Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju moved the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill in Lok Sabha to replace an Ordinance that was promulgated on January 2016.

The Ordinance seeks to amend the Enemy Property Act, 1968 and the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupants) Act, 1971.

The central government had designated some properties belonging to nationals of Pakistan and China as “enemy properties” during the 1962, 1965 and 1971 conflicts with the respective countries and vested these properties in the custodian of Enemy Property for India, an office instituted under the central government.

The Ordinance amends several provisions of the 1968 Act retrospectively.  Some of these changes will be deemed to have come into force from the commencement of the 1968 Act.  Consequently, divestments and transfers of enemy property that had taken place before the promulgation of the Ordinance, which are not in compliance with the Ordinance, will be considered void.

While Enemy Properties Act of 1968 defined an “enemy” as a country and its citizens that committed external aggression against India namely Pakistan and China, the Bill expands this definition to include legal heirs of enemies even if they are citizens of India or of another country which is not an enemy, nationals of an enemy country who subsequently changed their nationality to that of another country.

As against the definition of “enemy property” as laid down in the old Act as a “property that belonged to or was managed on behalf of an enemy”, the Bill clarifies that even in case of death of the enemy, the legal heir is an Indian or citizen of a country that is not an enemy and enemy changes his nationality to that of another country, these properties will continue to vest with the Custodian.

The vesting of enemy property with the Custodian will mean that all rights, titles and interests in the property will vest with the Custodian.  No laws and customs governing succession will be applicable to these properties.

The new Bill allows enemy property to be returned to the owner only if an aggrieved person applies to the government and the property is found not to be an enemy property.

The Bill l also allows the custodian to sell or dispose of enemy property. The Custodian may do this within a time period specified by the central government, irrespective of any court judgments to the contrary.

While the old Act prohibits transfer of enemy property by an enemy if it was against public interest or to evade vesting of property in the custodian, the Bill removes this provision and prohibits all transfers by enemies and renders transfers that had taken place before or after the commencement of the 1968 Act as void.

The Bill bars civil courts and other authorities from entertaining cases against enemy properties or against actions of the central government or the Custodian under the Act.

The Bill also removes the provision that empowers the custodian to maintain the enemy and his family if they are in India from the income derived from the property. 

The custodian can not only divest enemy properties but also fix and collect rent and license fee from enemy property, evict unauthorised occupants and removing unauthorised construction from such properties.

While the Public Premises Act of 1971 regulates removal of unauthorised occupants and construction from public premises, the Bill includes enemy properties within the definition of public premises.

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Enemy Property (Amendment & Validation) Bill 2016, to replace the Ordinance

PRS Legislative Research, New Delhi 

- The Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016 was introduced by Minister of Home Affairs, Mr. Rajnath Singh, in Lok Sabha on March 9, 2016.  The Bill seeks to amend the Enemy Property Act, 1968 and the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupants) Act, 1971.  It will replace the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Ordinance, 2016. 

- The central government had designated some properties belonging to nationals of Pakistan and China as ‘enemy properties’ during the 1962, 1965 and 1971 conflicts.  It vested these properties in the ‘Custodian of Enemy Property for India’, an office instituted under the central government.  The 1968 Act regulates these enemy properties, and lists the powers of the Custodian. 

- Retrospective application:  The Bill will come into force on January 7, 2016, the date of promulgation of the 2016 Ordinance.  However, several of its provisions will come into effect from the date of commencement of the 1968 Act.  Consequently, divestments (i.e., returning of property from the Custodian to the owner or other person) and transfers of enemy property, which had taken place before January 7, 2016 and are in contravention of the Bill, will be void. 

- Definition of enemy:  The 1968 Act defined an ‘enemy’ as a country (and its citizens) that committed external aggression against India (i.e., Pakistan and China).  The Bill seeks to expand this definition to include: (i) legal heirs of enemies even if they are citizens of India or of another country which is not an enemy, (ii) nationals of an enemy country who subsequently changed their nationality to that of another country, etc. 

- Vesting of property:  The 1968 Act allowed for vesting of enemy properties with the Custodian, after the conflicts with Pakistan and China.  The Bill seeks to amend the Act to clarify that even in the following cases these properties will continue to vest with the Custodian: (i) the enemy’s death, (ii) if the legal heir is an Indian, (iii) enemy changes his nationality to that of another country, etc.  The Bill further provides that vesting of enemy property with the Custodian will mean that all rights, titles and interests in the property will vest with the Custodian.  No laws and customs governing succession will be applicable to these properties.

- Divestment:  The 1968 Act provided that the central government may order for an enemy property to be divested from the Custodian and returned to the owner or other person.  The Bill replaces this provision, and allows enemy property to be returned to the owner only if an aggrieved person applies to the government, and the property is found not to be an enemy property. 

- Power of sale:  The 1968 Act permitted sale of enemy property by the Custodian only if it was in the interest of preserving the property, or to secure maintenance of the enemy or his family in India.  The Bill seeks to expand this power, and allows the Custodian to sell or dispose of enemy property.  The Custodian may do this within a time period specified by the central government, irrespective of any court judgements to the contrary. 

- Transfers by enemies:  The 1968 Act prohibited transfer of enemy property by an enemy if: (i) it was against public interest, or (ii) to evade vesting of property in the Custodian.  The Bill seeks to remove this provision, and prohibits all transfers by enemies.  Further, it renders transfers that had taken place before or after the commencement of the 1968 Act as void. 

- Bar of jurisdiction:  The Bill seeks to bar civil courts and other authorities from entertaining cases against enemy properties, or against actions of the central government or the Custodian under the Act.

- Powers of the Custodian:  The 1968 Act authorised the Custodian to take measures to preserve enemy property, and maintain the enemy and his family if they are in India, from the income derived from the property.  The Bill seeks to remove the duty to maintain the enemy and his family. Further, for the aforementioned purposes, the Act permitted the Custodian to carry out some measures (including selling, mortgaging or leasing enemy property).  The Bill seeks to add to the list of permissible measures: (i) fixing and collecting rent, license fee, etc. from enemy property, and (ii) evicting unauthorised occupants and removing unauthorised construction from such properties.  The Public Premises Act, 1971 regulates removal of unauthorised occupants and construction from public premises.  The Bill seeks to amend this Act to include enemy properties within the definition of public premises.

[Barun]

A stranger in one’s own Land 

by Ali Khan Mahmudabad, Indian Express, March 21, 2016 

* The new enemy property ordinance is more draconian than the one in 2010. It retrospectively rewrites the 1968 act and forecloses judicial recourse for countless Indians

Mauj-e khoon sar say guzar hi kyun na jaaey / Aastaan-e yaar say uth jaaein kya (Even if I drown in waves of blood/ How can I abandon the home of my beloved) The bloody events of Partition overshadowed Independence. Far from being an event in the distant past, Partition is a process that continues to unfold. Drawing a line across a map did not take into account the myriad ways in which Partition could actually never end. The messy and complicated migration of people would prevent this, and indeed, ultimately questions were bound to arise about how language, culture, history and indeed families, the carriers of human experiences, can be partitioned.

My family underwent an internal partition like many other families. Ten years after 1947, my grandfather became a Pakistani citizen. My grandmother and father remained Indian citizens. Following the Indo-Pak war in 1965, a legal category called “Enemy Property” came into force.

Under the Enemy Property Act, 1968, properties of citizens belonging to the “enemy” country were taken over by the governments of both India and Pakistan and temporarily vested in a custodian. By this time my grandfather was a Pakistani citizen, still holding property in India. This too was declared enemy property. In September 1965, my grandmother and other family members were summarily thrown out of their own home.

Hostilities ceased, peace treaties were signed, but the enemy property law continued to exist. The intention of the original act was to maintain and preserve the properties during the war. The 1968 act upholds the title of the original owner. This was subsequently confirmed by many courts of law. My grandfather died in London in 1973 and my father, his only son, claimed his inheritance as an Indian citizen. The next 30 years of his life were spent battling for his rights as an Indian citizen.

A legal odyssey began in the civil court of Lucknow, passed through the High Court of Bombay and ended in the Supreme Court (SC). Each court reinforced earlier orders and categorically upheld an Indian citizen’s right to inherit his father’s properties. Finally, in 2005, the SC restored the properties to my father and held that a citizen’s rights could not be usurped in this manner and deemed the government’s possession of the properties illegal since 1973. Importantly, the government had even appealed the SC judgment in 2005 but its appeal was rejected. Citizenship has always had a fraught relationship with property ownership but the battle was equally about a principle, about removing the blemish of “enemy” with all its alienating implications.

Five years after losing the case in the SC, the government suddenly brought in an ordinance in 2010, seeking to retrospectively change the original act of 1968.

The 2010 ordinance lapsed and the original act remained unchanged, along with all the judgments that were based on it. However, properties that had been restored following the SC order were summarily retaken as enemy property in August 2010. Thus, a new legal journey began.

Once more, the stigma of “enemy” reared its head. We went from court to court seeking justice. More than five years passed, when suddenly on the very day (January 7, 2016) that our matter was listed for final hearing in the SC, we learnt that yet another ordinance had been promulgated.

The new ordinance/ bill is more draconian than the one in 2010. It retrospectively rewrites the act of 1968 and renders all judgments made on the basis of the original act null and void. It seeks to undo decades of legal proceedings with little care for all the effort that countless Indians had spent on getting justice. Essentially, it closes the door to judicial recourse and transforms a “custodian” to “owner” as it mandates the government to sell all these properties. However, the most insidious aspect of the ordinance is that the very meaning of “enemy” has been redefined.

The definition of “enemy” now includes Indian citizens who happen to be the legal heirs of people who went to Pakistan. Faced with a choice during Partition, millions of Muslims opted to remain in India. Sadly, the new amendments make some Indian citizens’ identities wholly contingent on whether a relative went to Pakistan. My father, an astrophysicist by training and twice an MLA in Uttar Pradesh, has spent most of his adult life battling for his rights. He is fortunate to have been able to do sobut for lakhs of Indian citizens, the door to the judiciary is shut through the new ordinance.

Indeed, the reason for the promulgation of the ordinance has been that the custodian finds it difficult to do his job because of an increase in the number of legal cases related to “enemy property”. As is inevitable, over the years, various vested interests have taken advantage of “enemy property” and, indeed, one effect of the new bill is to metaphorically “put a lid” on all matters related to it, so that retrospectively since 1968, “enemy property” will no longer be subject to

judicial scrutiny.

The custodian continues to designate new enemy properties today despite the fact that hostilities ceased decades ago. In 2013, there were about 2,100 properties and in 2015, over 15,000 enemy properties. Many properties are not owned by Muslims but by people from other communities who have bought them over the course of the last 40 years. The ramifications of the bill will also undo their ownership.

Ironically, while this has been happening, I have been teaching undergraduates about the history of nationalism. The day the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016 was being passed in the Lok Sabha, we were discussing the idea of “strangers” as a political category. Although my father is an Indian citizen and, therefore, cannot be deemed a foreigner, the 2016 bill sees him, and many thousands like him, as strangers in their own country.

(The writer, Ali Khan Mahmudabad, 33, is assistant professor at Ashoka University and columnist for the Urdu daily ‘Inquilab’. His family is affected by the enemy property ordinance and the case is sub-judice in the Supreme Court. Views are personal.)

The original article is available here.

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/a-stranger-in-ones-own-land/

[Barun]

President re-promulgates Ordinance to amend Enemy Property Act  

* The ordinance has been re-promulgated for the fourth time now (January, March, June and August 2016).

* Highlights of the Bill analysed by PRS.

B. Muralidhar Reddy, New Delhi, The Hindu, August 29, 2016 

President Pranab Mukherjee on Sunday night re-promulgated an Ordinance to amend the Enemy Property Act (Eviction of Unauthorised Occuants Act of 1971 pending ratification by Council of States (Rajya Sabha).

The original Ordinance was promulgated on January 7 this year. It was passed by the Lok Sabha in January and was subsequently referred to Select Committee of the Rajya Sabha. The third Ordinance incorporating the amendments suggested by the Rajya Sabha Select Committee was promulgated by Mr. Mukherjee on May 31.

Since its validity was to expire on August 28, the President on the recommendation promulgated the fourth Ordinance on the subject. The Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Second Ordinance was promulgated on April 2.

The Ordinance amends the Enemy Property Act, 1968 and the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupants) Act, 1971. It replaced the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Ordinance, 2016, which was scheduled to lapse in April 2016.

Under it the centre had designated some properties belonging to nationals of Pakistan and China as ‘enemy properties’ during the 1962, 1965 and 1971 conflicts. It vested these properties in the ‘Custodian of Enemy Property for India’, an office instituted under the central government. The 1968 Act regulates these enemy properties, and lists the powers of the Custodian.

The Ordinance is deemed to come into force on January 7, 2016, the date of promulgation of the first Ordinance. However, several of its provisions will have effect from the date of commencement of the 1968 Act. Consequently, divestments (i.e., returning of property from the Custodian to the owner) and transfers of enemy property, which had taken place before January 7, 2016 and are in contravention of the Ordinance, will be void.

It expands the definition of enemy to include legal heirs of enemies even if they are citizens of India or of another country which is not an enemy, (ii) nationals of an enemy country who subsequently changed their nationality to that of another country.

The 1968 Act allowed for vesting of enemy properties with the Custodian, after the conflicts with Pakistan and China. The Ordinance amends the Act to clarify that even in the following cases these properties will continue to vest with the Custodian: (i) the enemy’s death, (ii) if the legal heir is an Indian, (iii) enemy changes his nationality to that of another country, etc.

The Ordinance further provides that vesting of enemy property with the Custodian will mean that all rights, titles and interests in the property will vest with the Custodian. No laws governing succession will be applicable to these enemy properties.

The 1968 Act provided that the central government may order for an enemy property to be divested from the Custodian and returned to the owner or other person. The Ordinance replaces this provision, and allows enemy property to be returned to the owner only if an aggrieved person applies to the government, and the property is found not to be an enemy property.

The 1968 Act permitted sale of enemy property by the Custodian only if it was in the interest of preserving the property, or to secure maintenance of the enemy or his family in India. The Ordinance expands this power, and allows the Custodian to sell or dispose of enemy property. The Custodian may do this within a time period specified by the central government, irrespective of any court judgements to the contrary.

The 1968 Act prohibited transfer of enemy property by an enemy if: (i) it was against public interest, or (ii) to evade vesting of property in the Custodian. The Ordinance removes this provision, and prohibits all transfers by enemies. Further, it renders transfers that had taken place before or after the commencement of the 1968 Act as void.

The Ordinance bars civil courts and other authorities from entertaining cases against enemy properties, or against actions of the central government or the Custodian under the Act.

* Powers of the Custodian: The 1968 Act authorised the Custodian to take measures to preserve enemy property, and maintain the enemy and his family if they are in India, from the income derived from the property. The Ordinance removes the duty to maintain the enemy and his family.

Further, the Act permitted the Custodian to carry out some measures (including selling, mortgaging or leasing enemy property). The Ordinance adds to the list of permissible measures: (i) fixing and collecting rent, license fee, etc. from enemy property, and (ii) evicting unauthorised occupants and removing unauthorised construction from such properties.

The Public Premises Act, 1971 regulates removal of unauthorised occupants and construction from public premises. The Ordinance amends this Act to include enemy properties within the definition of public premises.

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PRS: The Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016 - Highlights 

The Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016

Highlights of the Bill

- The Bill amends the Enemy Property Act, 1968, to vest all rights, titles and interests over enemy property in the Custodian

- The Bill declares transfer of enemy property by the enemy, conducted under the Act, to be void. This applies retrospectively to transfers that have occurred before or after 1968.

- The Bill prohibits civil courts and other authorities from entertaining disputes related to enemy property.

Key Issues and Analysis

- The Act allows transfer of enemy property from the enemy to other persons. The Bill declares all such transfers as void. This may be arbitrary and in violation of Article 14 of the Constitution.

- The Bill prohibits civil courts from entertaining any disputes with regard to enemy property. It does not provide any alternative judicial remedy (eg. tribunals). Therefore, it limits judicial recourse or access to courts available to aggrieved persons.

[Barun]

How The Central Government Subverted Both Procedure And Good Faith In Passing The Enemy Property Amendment Bill

By MAANSI VERMA | 8 April 2017

Caravan Magazine

http://www.caravanmagazine.in/vantage/government-subverted-procedure-good-faith-passing-enemy-property-bill

On 31 March 2017, Ghulam Nabi Azad, the leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha, stood up on the house floor to comment on the passage of the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016. The Rajya Sabha had passed the bill into law a few days earlier, on 10 March. Azad alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party had taken advantage of the low attendance in the house—only a handful of the opposition members were present in parliament that day, and the house was functioning just above quorum, which is 25 people—to ensure that the bill was passed. He further added that the Business Advisory Committee, which decides the business to be taken up by the house on that day, had unanimously earlier decided that the bill would be brought up only after a discussion had taken place among all political parties.

On this assurance, most of the opposition party MPs had left for the day. The government “did not inform us” that it would be bringing the bill up, Azad said. He added that the manner in which it did so was “against the spirit of the decision unanimously taken to which the government was party.” Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, the vice president of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the minister of state for parliamentary affairs, responded: “If the opposition MPs do not stay then it is their responsibility.”

Though the points Azad raised received little attention during the remainder of the session, his assertion was not without merit. The shrewdness with which the present government pursued and passed the Enemy Property Amendment Bill not only sets dangerous precedents, but is also against the democratic ethos of the country. “Behind the back of the honourable members of parliament and the opposition parties, that bill was passed,” Azad said.

The Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill amended the Enemy Property Act of 1968. During the 1962 war with China and the 1968 and 1971 Indo-Pak wars, the Indian government took over properties that belonged to nationals of these countries who had migrated out of India, declaring them “enemy properties.” The 1968 act regulated the government’s management of these properties, the rights of any heirs who may have stayed back in India, and the sale of such properties. The result of the amendment to this act is simple: if you are an Indian citizen who lives on such a property, which you may have either inherited from an ancestor or purchased from a person who migrated to an “enemy” country during or before the wars, you will no longer retain any legal claim to it. It does not matter, it appears, that India is no longer at war with Pakistan, or that the heirs stayed back and are citizens of India. Nor does it matter that, in the past, when disputes arose between the citizens and the government over “enemy” properties, in case after case, the courts directed the government to return the property to the heirs and declared them rightful owners, on the argument that the government was meant to be responsible for the properties for a temporary period only, and only for its caretaking.

The process to enact this amendment into law began in January 2016, when the president of India first promulgated an ordinance amending the 1968 Act to permanently confiscate “enemy properties.” In 2016 alone, this ordinance was re-promulgated four more times by President Pranab Mukherjee—a record number for any president of the country.

On 9 March 2016, the amendment bill passed through the Lok Sabha amid resistance and apprehensions. Members such as Pinaki Mishra, of the Biju Janata Dal, and Shashi Tharoor, of the Congress expressed their concerns over the bill. Tharoor pointed out that the amendment appears to create two classes of Indian citizens. He said: “The Bill will … adversely affect the rights of lakhs of Indian citizens and principally, let us call a spade a spade, of the Muslim community.” Asaduddin Owaisi, of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehaddul Muslimeen, added that the bill will also affect all the bona fide purchasers of such a property. “This government, with its brute majority, wants to show that they can trample upon the laws of Indian citizens,” he said.

The amendment bill faced its acid test in Rajya Sabha, where it was presented the next day on 10 March, and dispatched off five days later to a select committee—an ad hoc committee appointed by the house—headed by the BJP MP Bhupender Yadav. In the pursuit of impartiality, the house conventionally appoints an opposition MP to head a committee reviewing government bills—but this was not done. The committee comprised 23 members of parliament and its report upheld the bill almost in its entirety. Six of the 23 MPs submitted serious objections and dissented against the report. (Disclosure: I am currently working with the Rajya Sabha MP Husain Dalwai, of the Indian National Congress, as a researcher. Dalwai was a member of the committee, and one of the six MPs who dissented).

I spoke to close to a dozen people who gave their inputs to the committee, including senior lawyers and those who would be affected by the amendment. Many of them told me in confidence that they were critical of the bill in their submissions. Yet, most of their comments were not included in the report. A plausible—and grossly disappointing—conclusion that one can draw is that in its report, the committee selectively pruned the critical comments received on the bill. If the responsibility of a select-committee review is to act as a check on the government, they failed in this regard when the report was tabled in parliament, on 6 May 2016.

The tabling of the report reinvigorated the stand of the government. In the monsoon session, although the bill was listed several times, the government did not push for it to be discussed. It would be a safe guess to say that with bills such as the Goods and Services Tax Bill (GST) in the offing, the ruling party did not want to antagonise the opposition. The issue of demonetisation dominated the next session in the winter, leaving little room for anything else. The ordinance continued to be repromulgated—the fifth ordinance was issued in the last week of December 2016.

In January 2017, Dalwai challenged this ordinance before the Supreme Court, in the form of a public-interest litigation, or PIL. He argued in the PIL that in the case of Krishna Kumar Singh vs State of Bihar, the judgment, pronounced by a seven-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court earlier that month on 2 January, held that re-promulgation of ordinances is a “fraud on the Constitution” and subverts democratic legislative processes. The court did not hear the matter as the bill was with the Rajya Sabha, and Dalwai subsequently withdrew the petition.

This brings us to 10 March 2017. The date was likely strategically chosen—the results of the fiercely contested Uttar Pradesh assembly election were due the next day, and interest in house proceedings was understandably low. It was also a Friday: the Private Member’s Business day, when members of the house who are not ministers in the government present bills to the house. In parliamentary parlance, Fridays are also expected to be slow—most MPs are absent, and many leave to spend the weekend in their constituencies. It was also four days before the ongoing ordinance was due to expire.

The drama unfolded within the hour before the house was adjourned. At about 4 pm, discussion on private members’ matters came to an end. (Interestingly, one of the private-member bills discussed that day asked for Pakistan to be termed a “terror-sponsoring” nation, but it was withdrawn that day after many MPs said it would not be diplomatically feasible to do so.) The chair then moved on to the Enemy Property Amendment Bill, which was listed in the matters before the house. The few opposition MPs in the house, such as Jairam Ramesh of the Congress and Sukhendu Shekhar Roy of the Trinamool Congress, resisted the government’s move to push for the bill. They pleaded that a proper discussion on the bill be held the following week, with a fuller house. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley reminded the house that the fifth Ordinance was due to expire on 14 March, and that the bill must be decided “either way” before that. “Either way” implied that the bill could also be defeated—but the government’s use of this argument suggested that it was confident the outcome would be in its favour. The chair decided to take up the bill.

In the minutes that followed, the Congress, despite having significant strength in the Rajya Sabha, failed to live up to what is expected of the main opposition party. Appearing disconnected and disorganised, the party failed to put together a last-minute attack. Azad, the leader of the opposition who was not in the house at that time, remained elusive to the MPs as they made frantic calls to his office. In a final act of defiance, the few opposition MPs present in the house meekly staged a walk-out in the hopes of preventing quorum—a move that proved counter-productive. The BJP’s floor management was exemplary: the ruling party speedily marshaled the necessary numbers. Many senior ministers were in attendance—including Home Minister Rajnath Singh, whose ministry helmed the bill; Naqvi; Jaitley, and the human-resources development minister Prakash Javadekar. After Jaitley gave his justification for the bill, it was put to a voice vote—though it may as well not have been. There was negligible, if any, opposition present in the house—the votes were “ayes” all the way.

The amendment will affect the residents of properties across several states including Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and West Bengal, with a collective worth of Rs 1 lakh crore. It will also disproportionally affect India’s Muslim population—many of those affected are descendants of those who left before or during the wars with Pakistan. At best, it is unconstitutional. It discriminates among citizens on the basis of descent, which could constitute a violation of Article 14 of the Constitution, wherein all citizens are guaranteed equal treatment under the law. At worst, it is an attempt by this government to maintain its image of alienating minorities—to ensure that its voter base is secure, and that it continues to grow.

Maansi Verma is a lawyer and policy enthusiast who works with Husain Dalwai, a member of parliament in the Rajya Sabha, as a legislative and policy researcher.