India needs a refugee law, CAA is futile as exposed by the attacks on the Sikhs in Afghanistan

On the World Refugee Day today, the Rights and Risks Analysis Group (RRAG) called upon India to enact a refugee law given the absence of any refugee law in the country and inadequacy of the unconstitutional Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 (CAA).

India has over 400,000 refugees at present. In 2021, over 25,000 refugees from Myanmar belonging to the Chins and religious minorities in Afghanistan sought refuge in India.

“The failure of the Government of India to enact a refugee law despite the country being born out of Partition which saw the largest movement of refugees in the 20th century is deplorable. Since its independence, India had witnessed consistent influx of refugees especially from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, Myanmar, Pakistan, Uganda, Sri Lanka etc but it failed to ensure the principles of equality and non-discrimination on the treatment of refugees.”- stated Mr. Suhas Chakma, Director of the RRAG.

India enacted the CAA in 2019 to provide citizenship to religious minorities belonging to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian community from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan who had entered into India on or before the 31st day of December 2014.

“The CAA is not only discriminatory towards other religious groups and political refugees, it even fails to protect those it intends to i.e. Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian minorities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan. It is as if discrimination against the religious minorities in Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan had ended on 31st December 2014. That India has granted e-visas to over 100 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus on priority on 19 June 2022 following the terror attack on the Gurdwara in Kabul exposes the futility of the CAA. These Afghan Sikhs and Hindus on their arrival in India will suffer because of non-grant of refugee status as well as citizenship and might have to return back just like some of the Hindu refugees from Pakistan.” – further stated Mr. Chakma.

The RRAG urged for enactment of a refugee law in India to safeguard the rights of the refugees.