Ministry Of Home Affairs To Notify CAA Rules Before Implementation Of Model Code Of Conduct: Report

The CAA rules would ensure the processing of Indian citizenship applications from persecuted minorities in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh, according to the report.

Pakistani refugees gather to receive their Indian citizenship certificates from Jodhpur District Collector Himanshu Gupta, in Jodhpur.

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) could notify the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) rules any time before the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) is implemented, a report in ANI has claimed. 

The MCC gets enforced immediately after the election schedule is announced, which is likely to be done in the next fortnight, as per news agency PTI.

When the rules for the CAA are issued, the central government will start granting Indian citizenship to persecuted non-Muslim migrants -- Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians -- from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who had come to India till December 31, 2014. 

As per a report in PTI, the Home Ministry has readied a portal for the convenience of the applicants as the entire process will be online.The applicants will have to declare the year when they entered India without travel documents.

Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) could notify the CAA rules any time before the model code of conduct is implemented. The CAA rules would ensure the processing of Indian citizenship applications from persecuted minorities in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh: Sources

— ANI (@ANI) February 27, 2024

However, no document would be sought from the applicants, an official said.

The fresh announcement comes weeks after Union Home Minister Amit Shah announced that the Citizenship Amendment Act will be approved and implemented before the 2024 Lok Sabha election. 

Speaking at the ET Now-Global Business summit in Delhi, Amit Shah stated, “CAA is an Act of the country, it will be definitely be notified…It will be notified before the polls…There should be no confusion around it." 

The Parliament enacted the measure in December 2019. The CAA, introduced by the Modi government, seeks to provide Indian citizenship to persecuted non-Muslim refugees from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who came to India before December 31, 2014.

Since 2020, the home ministry has been taking extension in regular interval from the parliamentary committee for framing the rules.

Meanwhile, in last two years, district magistrates and home secretaries of over nine states have been given powers to grant Indian citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians coming from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan under the Citizenship Act, 1955.