Latest figures from the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) suggest that as of 2018, approximately 70.8 million women, children and men have been forcibly displaced — internally and otherwise — worldwide, marking a new high in the organization’s almost 70-year history. Displacement has doubled in the last 20 years, and the increasing number of protracted crises only indicates that there is a longer-term rising trend in the number of people seeking refuge from war, conflict, and persecution, and a pressing need for States to form policies that can effectively address this complex issue.
India is no stranger to dealing with massive inflows of people. With historically porous borders and unstable neighbours, the country has seen waves of refugees coming in from Pakistan, Tibet, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Myanmar, among others for more than 7 decades. However, despite hosting an upwards of 200,000 refugees, there is no specific law that governs their presence and protection. Given its geopolitical history and geographic location, the country has shied away from devising a national refugee policy in an effort to have complete autonomy over the people it lets in.
The problem with such an approach is that in the absence of an overarching policy, there is no standard definition of who a refugee is in the Indian political discourse. India is also not a signatory to the 1951 convention on Refugees or the 1967 protocol. This means that the government is then free to adopt an ad hoc approach to different refugee populations, making the response to forced displacement political, rather than one based on a codified model of conduct focused on protection. The legal vacuum also creates opportunities for the government to act selectively and can open doors for systematic discrimination and disenfranchisement of certain sections of the population.
Traditionally, India has boasted of adhering to the practice of non-refoulement and of being a welcoming host country, and it has been that for some groups. Because the federal government accepts certain regional groups on a prima facie basis — which means that by virtue of their country of origin, the government assumes they are fleeing persecution — India has warmly welcomed (non-Muslim) refugees from countries like Tibet and Sri Lanka, who collectively number over 150,000. Perceived as ‘peaceful people’ and assumed to have legitimate cases, India provides them with welfare benefits at the national level.
Similarly, in the case of people from the Chakma and Hajong communities — more than 65,000 of them, originally from the Chittagong hills in Bangladesh — who have been living as refugees in the Northeast and West Bengal for over five decades, the Supreme Court in 2015 directed the central government to grant them citizenship, despite opposition from certain groups in Arunachal Pradesh, where they are largely concentrated.
However, India has not always been so generous in dealing with people fleeing persecution. The Rohingyas fleeing Myanmar are considered illegal immigrants and a national security threat, and the Indian government has appealed to Myanmar to take them back, despite the fact that a UN fact-finding mission stated that Myanmar’s military carried out mass killings and gang rapes of Muslim Rohingya with “genocidal intent”.
The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) of 2019 is another brazen example of how the absence of a uniform law can lead to rights being awarded to only those who are considered politically advantageous to maintain the status quo in the host country. The Act aims to fast track the naturalization process for individuals belonging to Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Jainism, Zoroastrianism and Sikhism, which are considered minority religions in their countries of origins such as Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. While this falls in line with the current government’s advertising of India as ‘a natural home for persecuted Hindus’ it also allows for religious discrimination against Muslims, who are excluded from the category of vulnerable migrants. Though all Afghan and Rohingya refugees fall under UNHCR’s mandate in India, the Indian government is yet to declare any Muslim group legitimate refugees. This means that when non-Muslims would be immediately eligible to apply for long-term visas that would provide them with the right to legally work, pay rent and attend school, Muslims would have to endure more arduous processes to prove they are refugees and not economic migrants.
The lack of national legislation regarding refugees in India also highlights the glaring inconsistencies in India’s stance on migration and displacement at the international level. By signing the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants in 2016, and the Global Compact for Migration in 2018, India has technically declared support for those fleeing their homes due to fear of persecution, and advocated for shared responsibility of nations to tackle this challenge. However internally, India has not done anything to reflect this stance. While the country does host the largest refugee population in South Asia, the protection environment for people remains fairly restricted. There is a legal framework in place that offers asylum, but beyond that, opportunities for self-reliance and economic inclusion for refugees are limited. In the present political environment, where the government does not shy away from labelling refugees from neighbouring countries as infiltrators and terrorists, there seems to be no enthusiasm to frame a comprehensive and inclusive refugee policy.
For a long time, India has relied on soft power to advance its political ambitions — to stand strong against China, and be considered a noble and benevolent regional power. However, India’s new approach to foreign policy is marked by aggression, fueled by domestic policies that endorse force as the right counter to resistance. At a time when India is pursuing lofty international goals like having a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, it would be in its best interest to formulate policies that unite, rather than divide vulnerable populations in need.
To formulate such laws, India could look up to SAARC’s 2004 South Asian Declaration on Refugees and the National Model Law that was proposed to tackle forced displacement under global human rights standards. It is important that any decision taken by the Indian government to grant asylum is not isolated from its international responsibility to protect under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child — of which India is a signatory. This will not only bring India one step closer to achieving its foreign policy objectives, but it would also secure porous borders, enhance homeland security, and help India avoid international pressure and scrutiny on its inner workings.
References:
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Image source: Takshashila Institution