11. The Idea of Citizenship – An Analysis

A paradigm shift has taken place in the understanding of citizenship in India. For about 40 years, citizenship in India had a philosophical and ideological basis. Everyone born in the territory of India after Independence had the right to become a citizen. The basis for granting this right was associational: the founders of the Constitution wanted to adopt a concept of citizenship that was large enough to accommodate everyone (without any distinction) who was born on Indian territory. Indeed, citizenship in many republican countries is guaranteed to persons merely on the grounds of having been born within their territories after independence.

Apart from this, those who claimed Indian citizenship could do so by virtue of either of their parents having been born in the territory of India or their having been ordinarily a resident in the territory of India for not less than five years immediately preceding the adoption of the Constitution in 1950.

However, India began gradually to shift its commitment to this ideal meaning of citizenship. While the Citizenship Act of 1955 laid down that every person born in India on or after January 26, 1950, was to be a citizen of India by birth, the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 1986, provided that every person born in India would be a citizen of India only if either of his/her parents was a citizen of India at the time of his/her birth, prioritising, thereby, Indian parentage.

The recent amendments have further broadened the scope of citizenship as well as drawn some sharp criticisms regarding the same philosophical and ideological basis which served as the benchmark of citizenship at the time of independence.