ARE YOU AND I INDIAN CITIZENS?

THE question stings even sharper now than it did a year ago. Seventy-nine years after independence, after every flag-hoisting promise of a confident Indian Republic, after billions poured into digital identities that were sold as the unbreakable chain linking every Indian to the nation, Indians are still left clutching documents that the State itself now treats as scraps of paper in the rain.

- PRABHU CHAWLA

A year back, the Bombay High Court tore through the illusion with brutal clarity when it denied bail to an accused infiltrator and declared that Aadhaar, PAN and voter ID prove nothing about citizenship. The Supreme Court, in parallel proceedings, echoed the same cold truth about Aadhaar.

The torment began from there. If these tokens of belonging collapse under legal scrutiny, then what remains of the India Bharatiyas thought they were part of? That wound has now been ripped open wider by the ministry of external affairs. On Passport Seva Divas, it announced that the Indian passport is nothing more than a travel document and carries no conclusive weight as proof of citizenship. The very ministry that issues this document under the Passports Act has chosen to publicly detach it from the citizenship the Act was written to protect.

The torment deepens because this is not some distant legal quibble. It is the State reaching into the pocket of every citizen who has ever queued at a Passport Seva Kendra, submitted biometrics, and walked out believing the blue booklet affirmed their place in the nation. The Passports Act itself was framed in the language of belonging. Its preamble categorically states that passports would be given to those who are citizens of India. These opening words make this purpose unmistakable. Yet, the MEA now tells ordinary Indians that the passport they carry as the face of the nation proves nothing about who they are. This is not evolution of law. It is escalation of the same betrayal the courts exposed a year ago.