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Modi Govt May Grant Citizenship To Two Lakh Refugees This Independence Day. But There's A Catch.

Modi Govt May Grant Citizenship To Two Lakh Refugees This Independence Day. But There's A Catch.
A minority Hindu refugee from Pakistan gestures with a placard during a protest outside the United Nations office in New Delhi on April 17, 2013. Hindu refugees from Pakistan and right-wing Hindu activists staged a protest outside the UN office urging for intervention in the rehablitation of the Hindu minority community living in Pakistan and those who have been forced out of their encestral homeland in various provinces of the country. AFP PHOTO/ MANAN VATSYAYANA (Photo credit should read MANAN VATSYAYANA/AFP/Getty Images)
MANAN VATSYAYANA via Getty Images
A minority Hindu refugee from Pakistan gestures with a placard during a protest outside the United Nations office in New Delhi on April 17, 2013. Hindu refugees from Pakistan and right-wing Hindu activists staged a protest outside the UN office urging for intervention in the rehablitation of the Hindu minority community living in Pakistan and those who have been forced out of their encestral homeland in various provinces of the country. AFP PHOTO/ MANAN VATSYAYANA (Photo credit should read MANAN VATSYAYANA/AFP/Getty Images)

This Independence Day, hundreds of refugees may be awarded Indian citizenship by the government at the Centre. They only need to be Hindus. The Narendra Modi government, according to reports, is all set to keep the promise made by the Prime Minister during the 2014 general elections campaign. Modi had famously said that India will shelter Hindus from across the world, if they feel persecuted and wrong in their own countries.

According to a report on The Telegraph, the ministry officials are preparing a bill to amend the Citizenship Act, 1955, which will enable them to grant citizenship to Hindus.

"We have made several changes in the proposed bill to ensure the persecuted refugees get Indian citizenship without any difficulty. The bill is likely to be tabled in the monsoon session as the government wants to complete the process before Independence Day," a home ministry official attached to the foreigners' division told The Telegraph.

Catch News reports that approximately 2 lakh Hindus, who have migrated from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan maybe granted citizenship this Independence Day.

Telegraph further reports: "Last September, the home ministry had issued orders allowing Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Christians and Parsis from Pakistan and Bangladesh, who are now in India, to stay in the country indefinitely without worrying about passports or visas. The order had paved the way for beneficiary refugees to become Indian citizens."

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