Citizenship of the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir

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In the case of citizenship of the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, an Indian princely state located on the Himalayas until 1948/54, hereinafter referred to as “Kashmir” for short, no longer has any effect in the international field, as this has no effect on the descendants of the residents of this former state through the Indian , Pakistani and In a few cases, Chinese citizenship is covered.

The status of a subject remains important to this day, as the Kashmir conflict has continued to smolder since 1948. In view of the independence referendum, which the UN decided on Aug. 13, 1948, and the four smaller wars fought for the region, the status would be important again if there was a solution.

Historical background

All non-white subjects of Indian princely states were under constitutional law in British India as foreigners with the status of a "British protected person." With independence in 1947, they initially became “British subjects,” until the successor states created their own citizenships.

The State Subject Law was enacted by the Mahārāja in 1927 primarily to secure positions for the increasingly numerous educated members of the local middle class. Such posts were highly attractive at the time, especially since before 1935 Indians were excluded from all senior civil service positions in the British Indian Civil Service . The colonial power only allowed them a career in the covenated service, which roughly corresponded to the German middle and upper-class careers. The increased employment of well-educated, but mostly Hindu, Punjabis in Kashmir led to resentment among the natives, who were now granted privileges by law. Deep-seated xenophobia of the Muslim majority against Hindus is still a core problem of Kashmiri society in the Indian-administered part.

State Subject Act 1927

The 1927 ordinance created four classes:

  1. all whose ancestors had their permanent residence in the country before the assumption of government by Gulab Singh (r. 1846–57) or before 1886.
  2. all persons who did not fall into class I but who took up permanent residence in the Princely State before the end of 1911 and who had acquired real estate here.
  3. Those not falling under class I or II who lived permanently in the country and had a residence permit called Rayatnama or who had acquired real estate with an Ijazatnama permit and had lived in the princely state for at least ten years.
  4. for companies (i.e. legal persons) that the government assumed would be useful for the state or (semi) state-owned companies.

When married, wives automatically received the status of their husbands as long as they (even as widows) kept their permanent residence in the country. The class affiliation was passed on to descendants.

The law provides that with regard to (subsidized) land acquisition, scholarships or admission to the civil service, the members of the higher classes are to be given preference over those of the lower classes.

The Minister-in-Charge of the Political Department was responsible for issuing citizenship cards .

The supplementary ordinance of June 27, 1932 regulated the class of Kashmiris who lived abroad (i.e. outside the princely state).

It was determined that all emigrants continue to be considered subjects, and that the status in the male line is passed on over two generations.

In addition, people under the age of 18 were excluded from the opportunities to earn a living under the provisions of Class III.

After 1947

De facto administrative division of the former princely state of Kashmir (2003). The 1941 census showed a little over four million residents for the entire area at that time, 77% of them Muslims and 20% Hindus. Then as now, a large part of the population lives in the approximately 20 districts of the Jammu Division or Kashmir Division.

When India was divided, the Hindu Mahārāja did not initially opt for Pakistan, which he could have joined according to the Muslim majority, but instead voted for independence. After the first Indo-Pakistani war from October 1947 to January 1949 following the accession to India , the Delhi Agreement was reached in December 1952, which brought the end of the principality and the integration of the most populous part of the state as an Indian state. The Indian constitution of 1950 initially did not apply in the state of Jammu and Kashmir .

The incorporation of the Indian-occupied part of Kashmir into the Union brought about by the Delhi Agreement provided for the continued existence of the state subject status. The state of Jammu and Kashmir had special rights through Articles 35A and 370, which were incorporated into the Indian Constitution in 1954, on the basis of which they could continue the xenophobic politics of the feudal era. Articles 8 and 9 of the Kashmiri constitution gave the state parliament the right to enact provisions on the right of permanent residence and civil rights.

Before April 1, 1959, Indians who wanted to enter the Indian administered part generally required an entry permit. In the part administered in India, an ordinance on documents for permanent residents was introduced in 1963 , as a replacement for the rules on class III of state subjects. There was little difference in content. There was a ten-year residence requirement. In addition, there were some special rules for expellees from the period 1947/48. For unmarried women, the certificate was only valid until the wedding.

In 1947 almost 6000 families of so-called West Pakistan refugees (WPRs) who had fled the Sialkot region settled in the districts of Kathua , Samba and Jammu . You fell through the grid of state subject conditions. By 2018, their number had grown to an estimated 80,000–85,000 people. True, they had Indian citizenship rights and the right to vote at the national level. The regional government of Kashmir, which had extensive powers until Article 370 of the constitution was repealed on June 5, 2019, did not recognize them as its citizens for 70 years, so that they could not acquire any land and their access to higher education and social benefits was severely restricted was. It was precisely this group of people who filed several constitutional suits against Article 35A, as they saw the freedom of movement throughout India, etc., restricted.

The status of permanent resident was replaced in 2020 by the definition of a Domicile of the Union Territory . Prerequisites for this are fifteen years of residence (ten years for employees in the federal public service) or seven years of school attendance in Kashmir with a final examination after the 10th or 12th grade or the status of a registered refugee.

The Pakistan Citizenship Act of 1951 mentioned in two provisions the continued existence of the Kashmiri subordinate status with the simultaneous granting of Pakistani citizenship until the conflict is resolved. As early as 1970 the administrative reorganization of the Pakistani northern areas of Gilgit-Baltistan took place . With the establishment of the semi-autonomous Asad Jammu and Kashmir (= Azad Kashmir) in 1974, the local government was also responsible for regulating subject status. In 2017, a good 4.1 million people lived here.

Peripheral areas and special cases

After India's complete defeat in the 1962 border war , the People's Liberation Army soon allowed the few hundred displaced citizens to return or leave the country. The Aksai Chin area , a 38,000 km² region, has fewer than ten thousand civilians today.

As part of the border adjustment along the watershed, Pakistan ceded the almost deserted and nomadic Shaksgam Valley to China.

Subjects 1st and 2nd class of the Princely State and their descendants who resettled to Pakistan between 1947 and May 1954 had the opportunity to apply for a return permit on the Indian side from 1982 to 2019. All they had to do to obtain Indian citizenship was sign an oath of allegiance. The number of such returnees was minimal.

As in Azad Kashmir, the newly created regional government of Gilgit-Baltistan (previously “Northern territories”) was given the authority to regulate civil rights issues. The traditional prerogatives of the Kashmiris were abolished as early as the 1970s. In 2015, 1.8 million people lived here.

The 59,000 sq km, with low population under 300,000 inhabitants Ladakh is since 1 Nov. 2019 Indian separate union territory.

literature

  • Dhar, Sandhya; Political consciousness in Jammu region 1904–1977; 2015 (Kalpaz)
  • Beijing Review; No. 47/8 (1962-11-30)
  • Robinson, Cabeiri Debergh; Too Much Nationality: Kashmiri Refugees, the South Asian Refugee Regime, and a Refugee State, 1947–1974; Journal of Refugee Studies, Vol. 25 (2012), pp. 344-65
  • Zutshi, Chitralekha; Community, state, and the nation: Regional patriotism and religious identities in the Kashmir Valley, c. 1880-1953; 2000 (ProQuest Diss.); ISBN 9780599848238

References and comments

  1. ↑ As part of the Armistice Agreement. Further: Overview of UN resolutions concerning Kashmir.
  2. ^ Indian Independence Act 1947 , 10 & 11 Geo. 6, c. 30th
  3. ↑ Pakistani citizenship 1951 and India 1950/55.
  4. ↑ The first secondary schools in the country were the “College” founded in Kashmir in 1905 by Annie Besant and Pandit Bala Koul. Another institute opened in Jammu in 1908.
  5. ↑ № IL / 84 of April 20, 1927.
  6. ↑ № 13L / 1989.
  7. ^ Kashmir Accession document
  8. ^ Constitution (application to J&K) Order 1954
  9. ↑ Introduced on Jan. 26, 1957 as a replacement for the Kashmir Constitution Act of 1939, which regulated the status of a “subject” in §§ 5A-F.
  10. ↑ Permanent Resident (STATE SUBJECT) Certificate, short for Jammu and Kashmir Grant of Permanent Resident Certificate (Procedure) Rules, 1963. The authority to issue the documents lay with the Deputy Commissioner of the respective district.
  11. ↑ But only for people who came from undivided Jammu & Kashmir (before 1927).
  12. ↑ Jammu and Kashmir (Reorganization Adaptation of State Laws) Order, 2020.
  13. ^ Act II of 1951, Apr 13; Art. 8 (2) and 14 (B).
  14. ↑ The Pakistani identification documents contained the note “Native of the former State of Jammu & Kashmir,” which was later changed to “Azad Government of the State of Jammu & Kashmir”.
  15. Jump up ↑ Not all of which had permanently belonged to the Maharaja's sphere of influence. The Gilgit Agency had been "leased" under direct British administration since 1935. The privileges of Mir von Hunza and some other princes lasted until 1969.
  16. ↑ Hayat, Javaid; Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJK): Prospects for Democratic Governance Amidst Ambiguous Sovereignty, Absence of Self-determination and Enduring Conflict; Berlin 2014 (FU Diss.)
  17. ^ Azad Kashmir Act 1974.
  18. ↑ 6993 km². Also known as “Trans-Karakoram Tract” and in Chinese   喀喇崑崙 走廊 , Pinyin Kālǎkūnlún zǒuláng .
  19. ^ Agreement between the Government of the People's Republic of China and the Government of Pakistan on the boundary between China's Sinkiang and the contiguous areas, the defense of which is under actual control of Pakistan, signed in Peking, March 2, 1963 , a border commission clarified the exact course of the border in the following two years, a protocol on this was signed in Rawalpindi in 1965. In the absence of one, the citizenship of the population is not discussed. There are only around 750 km² of pasture land, traditionally used by von Hunzas in summer. Going on from an unofficial US perspective: Ramifications of the China-Pakistan Border Treaty; Pacific Affairs, Vol. 37 (1964), No. 3, pp. 283-295.
  20. ^ Jammu and Kashmir Grant of Permit for Resettlement in (or Permanent Return to) the State Act, 1982
  21. ^ Gilgit Baltistan Empowerment and Self-Governance Order 2009, Sept. 29.

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