New Delhi. The central government has started granting citizenship in West Bengal, Haryana and Uttarakhand under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). The Home Ministry gave this information. The ministry said in a statement that the empowered committee of the respective states granted citizenship to the applicants of the three states on Wednesday. After the notification of the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024, the empowered committee of Delhi granted Indian citizenship for the first time. The Union Home Secretary handed over citizenship certificates to these applicants at a program organized in Delhi on May 15.
The Indian government enacted the CAA in December 2019 to grant Indian citizenship to people of Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Buddhist, Parsi and Christian communities who came to India on or before December 31, 2014 due to religious persecution from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The law was notified after receiving Presidential assent but rules for granting Indian citizenship were issued on March 11, after a delay of four years.