Who Is (Not) a Citizen

The idea of citizenship has become uncertain and insecure. In a strange twist of law and logic, all people living in the territory of India are suddenly on trial to establish their citizenship. This is not what it always was, not even in the tumultuous years of Independence, Partition, the amalgamation of the princely states, and the making of a Constitution for India.

As the country was being carved up, citizenship was recognised in every person who was domiciled in the territory of India, was born in the territory of India as it was then emerging, or either of whose parents was born in the territory of India, or who had been ordinarily resident in India for not less than five years immediately before the Constitution was promulgated. At that point in our history, both territory and population had to settle into new identities. The