A. T HE R IGHT TO NAT IONALIT Y FOR EV E RY INDIV IDUAL A.3.4 The duty to avoid and reduce statelessness In addition to the several components mentioned above, failure of states to prevent and reduce statelessness within their territory also makes a citizenship deprivation exercise ‘arbitrary’.90 The cumulative effect of various individual rights enshrined in international human rights law, when combined with other articles and conventions relating to statelessness, establish the duty of states to prevent and reduce statelessness. [↘] If the current citizenship deprivation exercise of NRC and FTs in Assam is not halted, precarious citizens in Assam will be rendered stateless. This is because, as mentioned earlier, the state with which they have a genuine link with, i.e. India, would deprive them of its nationality, and their alleged state of nationality i.e. Bangladesh has consistently maintained that none of its nationals are illegally residing in India.91 Thus, the NRC and FT mechanisms are also arbitrary since if not halted, they would arbitrary deprive Indians nationals of their nationality and would create a stateless population in India, which is a grave violation of international law. 90 Mirna Adjami and Julia Harrington, ‘The Scope and Content of Article 15’ (n 79) 93. See also Section B of this chapter. 91 Shoaib Daniyal, ‘Bangladesh government expresses concerns over Assam’s NRC process for the first time’ (Scroll.in, 18 July 2019) <https://scroll.in/latest/930979/bangladesh-government-expressesconcerns-over-assams-nrc-process-for-first-time> accessed 13 July 2020. chapter i • status 63 SECTION I.A.3.4 see Section I.B (Chapter I), pg 66