Citizenship — PPSC previous year questions

Part II (Articles 5-11) of the Constitution deals with citizenship, so statement 1 is correct. Statement 2 is wrong because India has single citizenship for everyone with no exception for border states, and statement 3 is wrong because the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 relaxes naturalisation only for six religious minorities from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh, not from all neighbouring countries.

The Citizenship Act, 1955 gives three ways of losing Indian citizenship. Renunciation is a voluntary declaration by an adult citizen. It also affects his minor children. Termination is automatic loss on taking another country's citizenship by choice. Deprivation is forced termination by the Central Government. It is used for fraud, disloyalty or trading with the enemy in wartime. It also applies for a two-year prison term abroad within five years of registration, or seven years' stay outside India. 'Transfer of territory' (incorporation of territory) gains citizenship, it does not lose it. So 4 is wrong.

The USA has double citizenship: every American is a citizen of the United States and also of the state where he lives, with rights under both the federal and the state constitution. This is what the exam phrase 'double citizenship' means; it is not dual nationality (holding two countries' passports). India gives single citizenship. The UK has no single codified written constitution. Australia is a federation, not a unitary state. Switzerland has a bicameral Federal Assembly and is the classic example of direct democracy through referendums.

Section 5 of the Citizenship Act, 1955 covers registration. A person of Indian origin may register as a citizen after being ordinarily resident in India for seven years immediately before applying. The 2003 amendment raised this from five years to seven. Citizenship by naturalisation under Section 6 needs 12 years of residence in all. That includes the 12 months immediately before the application.

Single citizenship — along with parliamentary government, rule of law, the cabinet system, bicameralism and writs — was borrowed from the British Constitution. The USA follows dual citizenship and gave India its fundamental rights and judicial review; Canada contributed the strong Centre and residuary powers, and Australia the concurrent list and joint sitting.

Statements 1 to 3 restate Article 5, which fixed who was a citizen when the Constitution commenced on 26 January 1950: a person domiciled in India who was born in India, or either of whose parents was born in India, or who had been ordinarily resident for at least five years. There has never been citizenship by investment, so statement 4 is wrong and 1, 2 and 3 are keyed correct. For anyone born later the Citizenship Act, 1955 applies: birth alone gives citizenship only to those born before 1 July 1987, one Indian-citizen parent is needed for births from 1987 to 3 December 2004 and stricter parent conditions after that, while registration needs seven years' residence, not five.

Only the second statement is correct. There is no 'Overseas Citizen of India Act, 1955'. OCI registration comes from Section 7A of the Citizenship Act, 1955. It was amended in 2005, and again in 2015 when the OCI and PIO schemes were merged. Section 7D does let the Central Government cancel an OCI card. The grounds are disaffection towards the Constitution, registration obtained by fraud, or a sentence of two years' imprisonment or more.