The Supreme Court of India. | Photo Credit: The Hindu

Supreme Court to pronounce verdict on constitutionality of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act

The petitioners had questioned in court why Assam alone, among the border States, had been singled out to implement Section 6A

by · The Hindu

A Constitution Bench headed by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud is scheduled to pronounce judgment on Thursday (October 17, 2024) on the constitutionality of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, 1955.

Section 6A was a special provision inserted into the 1955 Act in furtherance of a Memorandum of Settlement called the ‘Assam Accord’ signed on August 15, 1985 by the then Rajiv Gandhi government.

Under Section 6A, foreigners who had entered Assam before January 1, 1966, and been “ordinarily resident” in the State, would have all the rights and obligations of Indian citizens. Those who had entered the State between January 1, 1966 and March 25, 1971 would have the same rights and obligations except that they would not be able to vote for 10 years.

The petitioners had questioned in court why Assam alone, among the border States, had been singled out to implement Section 6A. They had blamed a “rise in infiltration a consequence or an effect of Section 6A”.

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‘Demographic change’

The court had, in turn, asked the petitioners to show material that benefits given to cross-border migrants, who arrived in India between 1966 and 1971 just before the Bangladesh Liberation War, had led to radical demographic change which impacted the Assamese cultural identity.

The Constitution Bench had also made it clear that its ambit was limited to examining the validity of Section 6A and not the Assam National Register of Citizens (NRC).

“The reference made to us was on Section 6A. So the ambit of the issue before us is Section 6A and not the NRC,” Chief Justice Chandrachud had clarified.

The Constitution Bench had wanted details about the illegal influx from Bangladesh and the steps taken by the Centre to detect and deport those who had illegally entered.

A government affidavit filed in court had maintained that the detection, detention and deportation of foreign nationals who had entered India clandestinely was a “complex ongoing process”.

The Centre had also blamed the policies followed by the West Bengal government for creating a hurdle in the timely completion of fencing the Indo-Bangladesh border to prevent infiltrators and illegal immigrants.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, for the Centre, had argued that the “far slower and more complex” land acquisition policies in West Bengal had been a thorn in the side of even a vital national security project like border-fencing.

The Centre said the border was a total length of 4,096.7 km. It was porous, criss-crossed by rivers and the terrain was hilly. The border is along the States of West Bengal, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Tripura and Assam. The government highlighted that West Bengal alone shared 2,216.7 km of the border with Bangladesh while Assam shared a 263-km border with the neighbouring country.

The case was reserved for judgment in December 2023.

Published - October 16, 2024 10:40 pm IST