AHMEDABAD, Jan 4:
The granting of citizenship to Bollywood singer Adnan Sami recently has raised the hopes of over 50,000 Pakistani Hindus residing in Gujarat for more than 30 years on long-term visa to get Indian citizenship.
According to foreigners division of state police, over 50,000 Hindu citizens of Pakistan have migrated to Gujarat over the years since the Indo-Pak war of 1971 and have been staying in various parts of the state on long-term visa. Of them 10,000 people are living in Ahmedabad.
Of the migrants from Pakistan, applications for Indian citizenship of over 3,000 Hindus living in the city are piled up with the Ahmedabad district collector’s office. Most of them are living with their relations in the predominantly Sindhi localities of Vadaj, Sardar Nagar and Naroda.
Fed up with the red-tape of the police and civil administration, over 100 Hindu migrants have returned to Pakistan against their will after living in Ahmedabad for more than a decade, said a Sindhi Hindu community leader on condition of anonymity.
Over 500 Hindu migrants from all over the state have done so for similar reasons. There are over 8,000 children born of Pakistani Hindu migrant parents who too are awaiting the resolution of the application of their parents for Indian citizenship.
Last year, a special camp was held by the Union Home Ministry to take up the application for Indian citizenship where out of 87 cases only 50 cases were forwarded to Centre for approval.
If after just 13 years of stay in India, Adnan Sami can be granted Indian citizenship, why is it that the government is taking so much time to grant the same to the Pakistani Hindus who decided to migrate to India after the 1971 Indo-Pak war asked a community leader who has been living with his distant relation in Sardarnagar area of the city since 1974.
Of the estimated 50,000 Pakistani Hindus residing in Gujarat, over 10,000 are living in Ahmedabad on long-term visa they got on the basis of sponsorship of their relations. There are over 1,500 Pakistani Hindu migrants who have been living in Ahmedabad for the last 15-30 years.
A migrant Pakistani citizen is eligible to apply for Indian citizenship after seven years of stay but cannot buy property or start own business. Moreover, the Pakistani citizen is required to live in the same district continuously for seven years and requires to take permission from the district administration to move out of the district.
A child born of migrant parents has to wait for 14 years before applying for Indian citizenship. Such children also have difficulties in pursuing school and college education, pointed out a community leader.
With Narendra Modi becoming the Prime Minister, we hope his government would act proactively to solve the problems of migrant Pakistani Hindus who want to become Indian citizens, he added. (UNI)
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