NEW DELHI – Indian government claims awarding citizenship to 2,838Pakistani citizens.
India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday claimed that 2,838Pakistanis were among the refugees given Indian citizenship in the last sixyears as she attempted to defend the controversial Citizenship (Amendment)Act, 2019 that has sparked widespread protests in the country, *Times ofIndialink*reported.
“In the last six years, as many as 2838 Pakistani refugees, 914 Afghanrefugees, 172 Bangladeshi refugees including Muslims have been given Indiancitizenship,” Sitharaman, a member of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP), is quoted as saying by the publication.
“From 1964 to 2008, more than 4,00,000 Tamils [from Sri Lanka] have beengiven Indian citizenship,” Sitharaman said at ‘Programme on Citizenship(Amendment) Act, 2019’ in Chennai.
The programme is the Indian government’s attempt to gather support for thediscriminatory legislation.
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The Indian minister further said that till 2014 some 566 Muslims hadmigrated to India from Bangladesh and Afghanistan, claiming that the BJPgovernment had granted close to 1,595 citizenships to Pakistani migrantsand 391 to Muslims from Afghanistan between 2016-2018.
“It was also during the same period in 2016, that Adnan Sami was givenIndian citizenship,” said the Indian minister. “This is an example.”
