ABSTRACT
Revisiting the citizenship regimes of Myanmar and India through a comparative lens, this article argues that a specter of the “potential foreigner” is decisive in the adjudication of citizenship in both countries. Citizenship is conceptualized not only on the basis of who is a citizen, but a perennial suspicion towards those who may not be. We frame this argument in the context of increasingly restrictive atmospheres in both countries, epitomized by violence towards the Rohingya in Myanmar and the Citizenship Amendment Act in India. This paper employs an historical perspective, tracing the evolution of citizenship since the partitions of Burma and Pakistan from India. It interrogates the very notion of foreignness that is embedded in these discourses, through a detailed description of the religious, ethnic, racial, and administrative "other" etched in the legislative and socio-political fabric of both countries. In order to develop the idea of potential foreigner as a key element of national identity and citizenship policy, the paper examines crucial legislation over the last three-quarters of a century, and the consequences of linking narrowing definitions of ethno-national belonging to citizenship status.
Acknowledgments
The authors thank Michael Edwards and the Center for South Asian Studies at the University of Cambridge for organizing the “Axes of Difference in the Study of Burma/Myanmar” workshop in 2020, where an early version of this article was presented, and a workshop on “Cyclical Specters of Conflict in Southeast Asia” at Stockholm University in 2024 organized by Tomas Cole and the Department of Anthropology. They also thank the two anonymous reviewers for their detailed comments and feedback on an earlier draft of the manuscript. We would also like to thank Robert Shepherd for his detailed comments, edits, and guidance in the editorial process.
Notes
5 We use “Burma” to refer to pre-1989 Myanmar. The military junta changed the English name for the country in 1989 to match the Burmese language name for the country, “Myanmar.” The choice of using Burma/Myanmar is not political but rather to align with contemporary historical sources used in this article.
23 Othering takes the form of defining the boundaries of exclusion, “shaped by the institutional practices and their underpinning ideological conceptions, which define the paradigm for the allocation of political, social, economic, cultural and symbolic resources, privileges and duties” (Shani Citation2010, 149).
30 Although Rohingya may apply for naturalized citizenship if they can prove their parents or grandparents lived in Myanmar prior to 1948 or may apply for citizenship as the children of two citizen parents, the 1982 Law restricts claiming citizenship by birth to group membership of one of the 135 “national races,” which do not include Rohingya. See Cheesman Citation2017; Nyi Nyi Kyaw Citation2017.
37 Zarni Citation2021. In 2023 the NUG appointed U Aung Kyaw Moe, a Rohingya human rights activist, as a deputy minister in its Ministry of Human Rights.
45 Myanmar’s Constitution came into effect on January 4, 1948, and India’s on January 26, 1950.
54 Rhoads Citation2023a. One of the specters of coloniality that continued to be raised after independence was embodied by the “many communities of Asian origin who were considered foreigners who came to the country en masse under the British flag” (Sadan, Citation2018, 51).
59 Cheesman Citation2017; Rhoads Citation2023a; Arraiza et al. Citation2020; Nyi Nyi Kyaw Citation2015; Prasse-Freeman Citation2017 and Citation2023; Sadan Citation2018; Myint-U Citation2020; Formichi Citation2023. The British colonial dichotomy between “native” and “foreign” populations stems from colonial census-taking, in which population categories frequently changed from caste to language to religion in tracking colonial subjects and internal migration patterns (Ferguson Citation2015), particularly given the circular migration of laborers between India and Burma (Amrith Citation2013). But it also stems from the everyday experience of colonialism in Burma, which, rather than being marked by European settlers, was experienced as men of Asian origin serving as agents of British colonization, or otherwise seen to be benefiting from it in some way, at the expense of the Burmese (Sadan Citation2018, 51).
62 For more on restrictions on other forms of citizenship such as naturalization, registration and birth right seen prior to 1982, see Aung Ko Ko et al. Citationforthcoming.
64 Taingyintha (“son of the territory”) is usually taken to mean “national races” or “ethnic nationalities,” referring to Myanmar’s eight officially recognized ethnic groups and their so-called sub-groups, amounting to a state-sanctioned list of 135+ groups. See Ferguson Citation2015; Cheesman Citation2017.
65 Except in cases of dual nationality, issuance of a foreign passport or travel document, and leaving Myanmar permanently. See Sec. 16-17 of the 1982 Citizenship Law. See also Nyi Nyi Kyaw, Citation2015 and Citation2022.
72 McConnachie, Citation2021. However, these were not the first immigration raids to result in an influx of refugees crossing the Bangladesh border. In the late 1950s, immigration raids targeting Muslims led to at least ten thousand people fleeing across the border to what was then East Pakistan. At that time the 1951 Refugee Convention only applied to people who had been displaced due to the war in Europe, and UNHCR did not have any involvement. This displacement was treated as a bilateral issue and is generally left out of the historiography of Rohingya displacement.
74 While these are the routes that the vast majority of migrants took, this is not to suggest that people from the subcontinent only entered Burma by sea or from these ports alone. For more on Indian labor migration in colonial Burma, see Amrith Citation2013; Jaiswal, Citation2014.
77 The 1948 Citizenship (Election) Act provided the legislation and procedures for the provision in Sec. 11.4 of the Constitution allowing for people to choose Burmese citizenship based on a specific period of residency prior to independence.
80 The decision in Saw Chain Poon v. The Union of Burma extended eligibility to apply for citizenship by election to those previously naturalized under the 1926 Burma Naturalization Act (the Indian Naturalization Act of 1926 prior to the partition of British Burma from British India in 1937), thereby including those born outside of the British Empire who had previously been recognized as imperial subjects. This was reflected in a 1954 amendment to the Union Citizenship (Election) Act. While the initial application deadline was 1951, those who fell under this category of expanded eligibility were able to apply after the amendment came into effect.
82 NAI Citation1955.That the governance of property in India owned by Burmese citizens would be administered differently was not widely understood either.
84 The Foreigners Act (Act. No. III of 1864) applied to both India and Burma, but was replaced by the Indian Foreigners Act in 1946. Section 9 of the Indian Foreigners Act states that if the nationality of a person is not evident, then the onus of establishing whether the person is a foreigner or not lies upon the person and not the state.
85 Hasan Ali v. Secretary, Ministry of Immigration and National Registration 1959 B.L.R. (S.C.) 187; Meher Ali v. Secretary, Ministry of Immigration and National Registration 1959 B.L.R. (S.C.) 187.
86 Hasan Ali v. Secretary, Ministry of Immigration and National Registration 1959 B.L.R. (S.C.) 187; Meher Ali v. Secretary, Ministry of Immigration and National Registration 1959 B.L.R. (S.C.) 187, p. 194-195.
87 For example, see, among others: Peer Mohamed v. Union of Burma (1965) B.L.R. 51 (C.C.); Ko Aung v. Abdul Latiff (1958) B.L.R. 216 (H.C.); Hasan Ali v. Secretary, Ministry of Immigration and National Registration (1959) B.L.R. 187 (S.C.); Kali Mutu v. The Union of Burma (1962) B.L.R. 51 (C.C.).
89 See, among others: Indu Bhai v. The Union of Burma (1963) B.L.R. 348 (C.C.); Tai Yu Han v. The President of the Union of Burma and one (1953) B.L.R. 47 (S.C.); Bishna Lal v. The Union of Burma (1959) B.L.R. 3 (H.C.); Hasan Ali v. Secretary, Ministry of Immigration and National Registration (1959) B.L.R. 187 (S.C.).
101 NAI Citation1977. Foreigners were allowed to change residence within their township of residence. People classified as foreigners could apply for a twenty-four hour travel permit from township authorities, which they could then use to go to their local district center and apply for a seven-day travel permit. But sometimes travelling from the township to the district to get this permit took longer than twenty-four hours, making their stay in the district illegal.
114 NVCs are now a mandatory step in obtaining citizenship documentation for most Rohingya in Rakhine State.
115 Socialist Republic of the Union of Burma Ministry of Home and Religious Affairs, Citation1987.
118 For other descriptions of long lumyo chains on CSCs, see Nyi Nyi Kyaw Citation2015; Prasse-Freeman Citation2023, 690–691.
139 Chatterji Citation2012. Besides Articles 6–7, there is a less acknowledged yet distinct fear of potential foreigners elsewhere in the Constitution too, most notably in Articles 102(d) and 191(d), which prohibits anyone who may have inadvertently been eligible for another form of postcolonial citizenship (effectively Pakistan or Burma) from holding elected office in India. Similarly, Myanmar’s 2008 Constitution prohibits minorities, particularly ethnic Chinese, South Asians, and Muslims, from running for office.
140 As Shani points out, “the inclusion of Muslims within the nation required a careful balancing act between different citizenship discourses, each containing barriers to Muslims, preventing them from attaining full membership in the nation state” (Shani Citation2010,171). The remaining articles were primarily concerned with the rights of persons residing outside India (Article 8); persons voluntarily acquiring citizenship of other countries (Article 9); and the supremacy of the Parliament in regulating all matters related to citizenship (Articles 10–11).
143 The IMTD Act was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2005.
144 In 2005, the Supreme Court noted that the Act had resulted in expulsions in less than half a percent of all cases initiated. See Sarbananda Sonowal vs Union of India.
149 These amendments were cited by the Modi administration in 2019 when it accused the Congress Party of double standards in opposing the CAA-NRC, as they themselves had backed citizenship for Pakistani Hindus in 2003. See the Times of India Citation2019.
150 Two other legislative changes similar to the 2019 amendments are important. The Passport Rules Act (1950) and the Orders under the Foreigners Act (1946) were both amended in 2015 to exempt members of persecuted minority religious groups in Bangladesh and Pakistan seeking shelter in India from the requirement of holding valid passports or visas. If indeed the official concern is about religious persecution, it is puzzling why similar provisions were not extended to Ahmadi or Rohingya Muslims, persecuted sects in Pakistan and Myanmar, respectively.
159 Beaugrand Citation2011, 234–36; see also Graeber Citation2012. Arraiza et. al describe this primarily as the deprivation of individual rights by arbitrarily denying official documentation, which eventually leads to the “consideration of groups of inhabitants who are, or arguably descend from, migrants (often regardless of how many generations) as foreigners” (2020, 198). As mentioned earlier, the Indian Foreigners Act (1946) and the Burmese Foreigners Act (1864) derive from the same nineteenth century British Indian legislation, both placing the burden of proof on the individual and not the state, thereby leading to significant arbitrary discrimination.
163 The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2003.
166 Approximately 33 million Assam residents were included on voter lists. See India Today Citation2019. Article 1 of the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons defines a “stateless person” as someone “not considered as a national by any state under the operation of its law.” UNHCR Citation1954.
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Funding
The archival research on Myanmar for this article was funded by the Swedish Research Council Starting Grant in Development Studies (2022-04861), “Tracing Citizenship and Displacement: New Faces of Statelessness in Myanmar.”
Notes on contributors
Elizabeth L. Rhoads
Elizabeth L. Rhoads is a researcher and Visiting Senior Lecturer at the Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies, Department of History, Lund University, Sweden. Her current research on histories of citizenship and displacement in and from Myanmar is funded by the Swedish Research Council.
Ritanjan Das
Ritanjan Das is a University Lecturer in contemporary South Asian politics at the Leiden University Institute of Area Studies in the Netherlands. His primary area of interest is the political economy of development in contemporary India and South Asia. His most recent work explores questions of identity, sovereignty, marginalization, and democratic deficits in South Asia.
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0390-7217
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