A Constitutional Court has agreed to hold hearings on a number of petitions challenging the legitimacy of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act of 1955.
Section 6A’s History
- Following the signing of the ‘Assam Accord’ Memorandum of Settlement on August 15, 1985, Section 6A was added as a special provision to the 1955 Act.
- This agreement, supported by the Rajiv Gandhi government, sought to safeguard Assam’s cultural, linguistic, and social identities.
- It marked the end of a six-year-long struggle against illegal immigrants, especially from Bangladesh, led by the All Assam Students Union.
Legal Challenge
- Defence of the Centre: The Union government has maintained that Section 6A is legally sound and has asked the court to dismiss the petitions. These petitions were filed over 40 years after Section 6A was enacted.
- Section 6A Provisions: Under Section 6A, foreigners who entered Assam prior to January 1, 1966 and were “ordinarily resident” in the State were accorded all of the rights and obligations of Indian citizens. Those who arrived in the state between January 1, 1966, and March 25, 1971, received comparable rights and obligations but were barred from voting for ten years.
- Petitioners, including Assam Public Works, contend that Section 6A’s “discriminatory” nature in granting citizenship to immigrants, particularly illegal immigrants, violates Article 6 of the Constitution, which establishes the cutoff date for granting citizenship to immigrants as July 19, 1948.
Key Points of Disagreement
- Cultural Rights Preservation: The Assam Sanmilita Mahasangha, a civil society organisation located in Guwahati, has urged that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) for Assam be updated using the 1951 NRC rather than the March 1971 electoral registers.
- Involvement of the Supreme Court: In December 2014, the Supreme Court issued 13 questions concerning the constitutionality of Section 6A, including its impact on Assamese citizens’ political rights and whether it violated the Assamese people’s right to preserve their cultural identity. A three-judge Bench referred the case to a Constitution Bench in 2015.
Why are we debating this?
- The Section 6A lawsuit has been ongoing for several years, overlapping with the Supreme Court’s monitoring of the final Assam NRC list, which removed nearly 19 lakh people, in August 2019.
- In addition, the disputed Citizenship (Amendment) Act, which gave rapid citizenship to immigrants from minority communities in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, was passed in recent years.
Source: https://www.indiatoday.in/law/story/assam-nrc-supreme-court-petitions-challenging-section-6a-citizenship-act-from-october-17-2438259-2023-09-20#:~:text=The%20Supreme%20Court%20Constitution%20bench,Citizenship%20Act%20has%20been%20challenged.