being competent and independent bodies deciding individuals’ citizenship status. 56 SECTION I.A.3.2 Persons excluded from the NRC must be considered Indian citizens until all avenues of appeals are exhausted. However, as they must file their appeals before FTs, they face the very real risk of deprivation of nationality, because of the arbitrary functioning of FTs as explained above. It is clear that the NRC and FT process in Assam lack any due process safeguards. They unlawfully and arbitrarily threaten to deprive persons of their Indian nationality. A.3.2 Procedural standards in international law on nationality Even if the due process requirements are fulfilled, deprivation of nationality will be ‘arbitrary’ if it does not have a legitimate purpose.56 It will also be ‘arbitrary’ if it fails to either respect the interrelated international legal standard of proportionality or if it is not in accordance with the law.57 This section elaborates upon these three prerequisites. It is important to note that all of these pre-conditions need to be satisfied, and failure to do so on any one count renders the entire deprivation procedure unlawful. see Section I (Chapter II), pg 103 Firstly, a deprivation process must serve a legitimate purpose that is consistent with international law, which necessarily includes international human rights law. Article 8 of the Draft Articles on the Expulsion of Aliens explicitly mandates that deprivation of nationality in order to convert nationals into aliens and for the sole purpose of expelling them would not qualify as a legitimate purpose.58 Precarious citizens in Assam are being detained under the pretext of deportation to their alleged country of nationality i.e. Bangladesh [↘]. They are facing a threat of deprivation of Indian nationality to facilitate their 56  Shamima Begum (n 34). See ‘Skeleton Argument of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms while Combating Terrorism’ (n 34). 57 ibid. 58 UNGA ‘Report of the International Law Commission: Sixty-sixth session’ (5 May-6 June and 7 July-8 August 2014) UN Doc A/69/10, 32. SECURING CITIZENSHIP