     relations between majority and minority populations; between racial/ ethnic groups, as well as between those considered nationals and those who were considered immigrants. In Chapter 8, Bhat demonstrates these dynamics with the example of the 1946 Foreigners Act in India and how it is applied to persons with contested citizenships claims. 1.5.3 Borders and Mobilities As mentioned, the creation of borders and associated border regimes during and after the colonial period is a major cause of statelessness in the region. While many state borders were arbitrarily drawn by colonial powers when dividing up their ‘possessions’ in Asia, new state borders continued to emerge even after the end of colonial rule – in South Asia, after the partition of India and Pakistan and the independence of Bangladesh; in Central Asia following the dissolution of the Soviet Union; and more recently, Timorese independence in 2002. In Chapter 4, Ismatov reveals that statelessness in Central Asia has involved ‘largely hidden and complex elements of state succession’.116 New borders frequently cut across territories that were historically, culturally, economically, and politically connected, often dividing communities and producing new ‘immigrant’ communities. In Chapter 8, Bhat alludes to the challenges the violent formation of state borders in South Asia generated for who is perceived to be a citizen and who is not. At the same time, territorial boundaries can be more fluid and indeterminate than they often seem. Persons born in many border areas of Asia may find it much harder to prove their citizenship, more so if their traditional communities span across borders and their belonging to any one state is contested. Border areas of Thailand (the site of ChevaIsarakul’s research in Chapter 6) and Malaysia (especially Sabah, see also Mohammed Razali’s work in Chapter 3) are just some examples of many in Asia.117 New borders combined with evolving regimes of border control have also had an impact on the regulation of cross-border mobility with Aziz Ismatov, ‘Hidden Statelessness Diemnsions of State Succession in Central Asia: Transit to a Solution for Stateless Trans-Border Wives and Children’, Chapter 4. 117 See more generally Sriprapha Petcharamesree, ‘Borders, Citizenship, ‘Imagined Community’ and ‘Exclusive Sate’ and Migration in Southeast Asia’ in Sriprapha Petcharamesree, and Mark P Capaldi (eds), Migration in Southeast Asia (Springer 2022), 23. 116 https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009399555.003 Published online by Cambridge University Press