‘Modi Has No Indian Citizenship Documents’

India's Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi has no citizenship documents, Modi's office said Friday in response to a question.

On February 17, an Indian resident, Subhankar Sarkar asked if the prime minister held citizenship documents under the Right to Know Act.

In answer to his request, Praveen Kumar, Under-Secretary of the Indian Prime Minister's Office, wrote: "Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi is a citizen of India by birth pursuant to Section 3 of the Citizenship Act, 1955 and as such, there is no problem of obtaining a citizenship certificate which is for citizenship through registration."

Ever since the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led government passed the CAA, protests against the controversial citizenship law have continued across India, with every citizen worrying over how to prove citizenship. Even Modi fails to show the citizenship certificate.

At least 42 people were killed in Hindu-Muslim violence in northeast New Delhi, amid mounting international criticism that authorities failed to protect minority Muslims.

The disputes erupted over a citizenship bill passed by Modi's Hindu nationalist government in December providing six religious communities from neighboring countries-though not Muslims-with a route to Indian nationality.

Critics argue the legislation is oppressive and falls in addition to other steps such as the revocation of autonomy for Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir, which has sparked questions regarding the existence of the 200 million Muslims in India.

Government opponents, however, blamed the violence this week on leaders of Modi's BJP, which was trounced at the start of the month at local Delhi polls.

The violence morphed into street battles between Hindu and Muslim groups, with the police largely ineffective in ending the violence.

Source: Anandabazar