A. T HE R IGHT TO NAT IONALIT Y FOR EV E RY INDIV IDUAL The precarious citizens in Assam have a genuine link to India through their long-term habitual residence, extensive family ties, participation in public life, and their attachment to India. The absence of a genuine link with any other nation, including Bangladesh (their alleged country of nationality) strengthens their genuine link to India. It also must be noted that many precarious citizens have children and grandchildren who were born and raised in India. Stateless individuals in India also have a genuine link in cases where the elements mentioned above are present. International human rights law over the years has provided another test to determine the connection of nationality between an individual and their country. Article 12(4) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (‘ICCPR’) prohibits any state from arbitrarily depriving a person the right to enter his own country. In Warsame, the Human Rights Committee had the opportunity to interpret the phrase ‘own country’.26 This test is based on a sociological account of membership. It operates within the human rights paradigm, where individual rights flow from personhood and not from their status. The Committee considered the presence of Warsame’s family in Canada, the language he speaks, the long duration of his stay in Canada as well as the lack of any effective ties with any other country (here, Somalia). The test in Warsame supplements the nationality centric genuine link test and informs the interpretation of statelessness in international law. It is especially relevant in situation where states misinterpret and refuse to recognise the genuine link of individuals to their country. Subsequently, in Nystrom, the Committee held that Australia was ‘his own country’ on grounds similar to those in Warsame.27 The Committee clarified that the applicants shall not be stripped of the nationality of their own country and expelled to a third country since it would violate their human rights. 26  Jama Warsame v Canada Comm no CCPR/C/102/D/1959/2010 (UN Human Rights Committee, 1 September 2011). 27  Nystrom v Australia Comm no 1557/2007 (UN Human Rights Committee, 1 September 2011). chapter i • status 45 SECTION I.A.1