From Sana Din: I’ve been trying to find the emotional strength to address how devastating the Citizenship Amendment Act is for Indian Muslims and the region as a whole. The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) which was passed in both houses of Indian Parliament on Wednesday is the single most destructive piece of legislation since Partition, putting the onus of proving one’s citizenship explicitly on Indian Muslims.
The law allows for anyone who isn’t Muslim from neighboring countries to become an Indian citizen. CAA was designed to function as a citizenship test for India’s Muslim population of 200 million, creating the world’s largest stateless population.
About 50 percent of Indian Muslims are illiterate, many don’t know their birthdates, where they were born, or which hospital provided these documents; all of which compound the impact of this discriminatory law.
Both CAA and the National Registration of Citizens (NRC) work to make a stateless Muslim population that can be imprisoned in detentions centers. Muslims have begun to be detained in makeshift detention centers and more are being constructed.