STATELESSNESS IN INDIA As per Rule 4(3) of the Citizenship Rules, any enumerator at the local level is empowered to arbitrarily determine citizenship status and mark people as ‘doubtful’ citizens. This additional layer of arbitrariness built into the NRIC does not require an evidentiary examination and can be based solely on information collected and entered in a form, during the NPR enumeration. Those unwilling to volunteer legacy information on their parents can be fined or even imprisoned.68 As a result, the NRIC is likely to have catastrophic impacts, as already witnessed in provincial governments led by nationalistic political parties.69 (F) NRIC, NPR & the CAA: A triumvirate targeting Muslims In addition to the NRIC, the Indian Government has also passed the CAA as mentioned before. CAA will work both independently and in conjunction with the NRIC. The ostensible objective of the CAA is to protect minorities from “religious persecution”. However, in its text, the law does not mention “religious persecution”, which is included by reference to the Foreigners’ Order, 1948, and the Passport (Entry into India) Rules, 1980. These rules are passed by executive actions and any amendment can simply be made without legislative scrutiny, opening the claimed foundation of the CAA to a nonlegislative amendment. Even within the parameters of protecting persecuted religious minorities, the legislation fails catastrophically, in that it does not extend these rights to other persecuted minorities in neighbouring Muslim countries, nor to persecuted Muslims in non-Muslim neighboring countries, or those without faith. The NPR, NRC and CAA together weaponize India’s citizenship in ways never envisioned before.70 Given the discretionary powers of NPR enumerators in attributing a ‘doubtful’ status, and due to the flaws and biases described above as witnessed in the example of 68 This has been provided for under several laws, for e.g.: Rule 17 of the Citizenship Rules, 2003; Section 176 & 179 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860; and Section 8 read with Section 11 of the Census Act, 1948, Annexure I. 69 Arijit Sen & Leah Verghese, Border Criminologies, Weaponising Citizenship in India, February 19, 2020. See also, India Today, Over 32,000 refugees identified in 21 districts for CAA: UP minister, January 13, 2020. 70 Annexure N explains the tri-partite scheme of the NPR, NRIC, and CAA. 9