Answer:

According to United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR), a refugee is someone who has been forced to flee his or her country because of persecution, war, or violence. A refugee has a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. War and ethnic, tribal and religious violence are leading causes of refugees fleeing their countries.

When people flee their own country and seek sanctuary in another country, they apply for asylum – the right to be recognized as a refugee and receive legal protection and material assistance. An asylum seeker must demonstrate that his or her fear of

persecution in his or her home country is well-founded. Hence refugee is an asylum seeker whose application has been successful.

Although India has provided shelter to one of the largest refugee populations in South Asia, it lacks a uniform asylum policy. India has not signed the 1951 United Nations Refugee Convention on the Status of Refugees, or its 1967 Protocol. In contemporary time need of a uniform asylum policy is felt due to following reasons:

♤ Due to absence of a uniform policy the government has to consider requests on case to case basis which is lengthy and time consuming process.

♤ India seeks to have a seat in permanent seat in UNSC and membership of groups like NSG; For a global leader it is necessary to have a refugee policy in place which will enhance its good will.

♤ By having an asylum policy India will be in a better situation to deal with issues like Baluchistan as it would get support from those leaders who fight for Humanitarian cause. This will also help in dealing with Pakistan strategically.

♤ Although existing provisions might serve the need of asylum seeker but compiling them into a uniform law will project a positive picture of the country before international arena.

♤ Since India is one of the largest contributor of troops in UN Peace keeping mission, having a policy for asylum will complement these efforts.

However, same time adoption of a uniform asylum policy can create some challenges like:

♤ Borders in South Asia are extremely porous and any conflict can result in a mass movement of people leading to a strain on local infrastructure and resources and also upsetting the demographic balance

♤ It will be bound by law not to repatriate a single refugee against their will which is sometime necessary to deal with political crisis

♤ Giving shelter to every refugee may create new problems like human trafficking and drug trafficking and abuse. It will put additional financial and administrative burden on the State.

India has already faced a surge of refugees and it has dealt the matter well to the large extent possible without any formal policy. The present Citizenship Amendment bill is a step towards making well framed asylum policy but it is still narrow. In this context a lot needs to be done to wider its ambit so that it can cover all asylum related cases comprehensively.