Indian? Prove it
Many people felt worried when a government official said that having an Indian passport does not automatically prove that someone is an Indian citizen. This sounds surprising because most of us think a passport is the strongest proof of being Indian.
The official was technically correct. A passport is mainly a document that lets people travel to other countries. In some special cases, even people who are not Indian citizens can receive certain types of Indian passports. Courts have also said that a passport alone is not enough to prove citizenship.
The bigger problem is that India does not have one single document that proves citizenship for everyone. Instead, people may need different papers, such as birth certificates, family records, or other government documents.
This can be difficult because many Indians, especially poorer people, do not have all these papers. Some documents may have been lost, damaged, or never made in the first place. Even getting an old birth certificate can sometimes be very hard.
People worry that if one document is not accepted, they may be asked for more and more proof. What if someone has proof that they were born in India but cannot find documents showing where their parents were born? What if those records no longer exist?
No one is being asked for such documents right now. The official’s statement was not wrong. But the government should understand why many ordinary people feel anxious. Most people who think of themselves as Indian citizens want to know that they will not one day have to struggle to prove it.
Disclaimer
Views expressed above are the author’s own.
