Can’t Seek Indian Citizenship Till Pakistani Citizenship Is Renounced, HC Tells Two Minors

The High Court of Karnataka recently refused to give direction to the Indian authorities as sought by 2 minor Pakistani citizens to grant them citizenship.

The petition was filed by two minors born to an Indian woman and a Pakistani man. The 17-year-old girl and her 14-year-old brother are holding citizenship in Pakistan.

The minors, represented by their mother, a Bengaluru resident, sought consideration of their representation for issuance of Indian passports and granting them citizenship, citing that they surrendered their passports to the Indian Consulate in Dubai.

However, Justice M Nagaprasanna pointed out that even as of date, both the children are citizens of Pakistan, as their citizenship has not been renounced in terms of the law of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.

The judge stated that “Unless they renounce the citizenship of Pakistan, they can’t become citizens of this country. It is not a case where these children are without citizenship or landless or stateless.”

Dwelling further, the judge said that it is the laws of Pakistan that don’t permit them to renounce citizenship of that country, and in fact, the Consulate General of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in Dubai is categorical in his reply that a minor child/children cannot renounce the citizenship till they attain the age of 21.

The judge stated that “If the laws of Pakistan are inflexible to a situation of this kind; so are the laws of this nation, which can’t be made flexible in the peculiar facts of this case. The children who are now seeking Indian citizenship can do the same only after they renounce their citizenship of Pakistan as admittedly, their biological father is a citizen of Pakistan. The children are declared to be citizens of Pakistan.”

The mother might be an Indian citizen but the children can’t be granted citizenship “unless violence is done to the language of the Citizenship Act-1955 as they are already citizens of Pakistan.”

And further added, “would not indulge in any such violence to the language of the mandate of the statute”. However, the rejection of the petition will, not come in the way of the authorities considering the case of the petitioner, if they fulfill the necessary requirements.