NEW DELHI/GUWAHATI: The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the constitutional validity of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, 1955, by a 4:1 majority.
A five-judge Constitution Bench, comprising CJI D. Y. Chandrachud, Justices Surya Kant, MM Sundresh, J.B. Pardiwala, and Manoj Mishra, delivered the judgement. Justice Pardiwala gave a dissenting judgement to hold Section 6A as unconstitutional with prospective effect. Section 6A was inserted to give effect to the Assam Accord.
The CJI said that the Assam Accord was a political solution to the problem of illegal migration, and Section 6A was the legislative solution. The majority of judges held the view that the parliament had the legislative competence to enact the provisions. Section 6A was enacted to balance the humanitarian concerns with the need to protect the local populations.
The bench said that the separation of Assam from other states that shared larger borders with Bangladesh was rational, as the percentage of immigrants among the people of Assam was higher there than in other states. The impact of forty lakh migrants in Assam is greater than 57 lakh migrants in West Bengal because the landed areas in Assam are much smaller compared to the neighbouring state.
During the hearing, the major judges of the bench opined that "the cut-off date, March 25, 1971, was rational, as it was the date when the Bangladesh Liberation War ended. The objective of the provisions (Section 6A) must be seen in the backdrop of the Bangladesh Liberation War. Section 6A was neither over-inclusive nor under-inclusive."
Justice Kant rejected the petitioner's contention that Section 6A violated the principle of fraternity embedded in the preamble to the Constitution. He said that fraternity cannot be understood in a narrow manner to hold that one should be able to choose one's neighbour.
On the contention regarding Article 29, Justice Kant said that they (petitioners) have not been able to show any impact on the Assamese culture and language due to immigration. In fact, Section 6A mandates that the migrants who entered Assam after the cut-off date should be detained and deported.
The bench concluded on Section 6A: "(a) Immigrants who entered Assam before January 1, 1966 are deemed to be Indian citizens. (b) Immigrants who entered Assam between January 1, 1966, and March 25, 1971 are entitled to seek Indian citizenship, provided they fulfil the eligibility criteria. (c) Immigrants who entered Assam on or after March 25, 1971 are declared to be illegal immigrants and are liable to be detected, detained, and deported.
Justice Pardiwala was of the view that 'a piece of legislation may be valid at the time of its enactment, but by afflux of time, it has become temporarily flawed. The cut-off date, January 1, 1966, was set to assuage the apprehension of the protestors. The legislature could have simply conferred deemed citizenship to anyone who entered before 1971. But the fact remains that the statutory category was created from 1966 to 1971, subject to stricter conditions (without voting rights for a decade), which would mean that the conferment of citizenship was not only objective, and it was in fact to pacify the people of Assam that such inclusion would not impact the then upcoming elections in the state'.
On December 7, the apex court had directed the Central government to furnish data on the number of immigrants who were conferred Indian citizenship through Section 6A(2) of the Citizenship Act, 1955, and what steps have been taken so far to curb illegal migration into Indian territory.
The affidavit had stated that 14,346 foreign nationals were deported from the country between 2017 and 2022, and 17,861 migrants who had entered Assam between January 1966 and March 1971 were given Indian citizenship under the provision.
32,381 persons were declared foreigners by orders of Foreigners Tribunals between 1966 and 1971, it had added. (Agencies)
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