More than four years after the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 (CAA) came into force, the Indian government on Monday, March 11, notified the rules required to implement the law, enabling eligible applicants to begin the process of seeking citizenship under its provisions, according to reports by Al Jazeera.

The notification operationalizes the CAA, which offers an expedited path to citizenship for Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who entered India on or before December 31, 2014 and faced religious persecution. The Act continues to exclude Muslims from these countries, as well as Sri Lankan Tamil refugees.

The CAA represents the latest development in India’s evolving citizenship framework, which dates back to the Constitution of India in 1949 and the Citizenship Act of 1955. While the law was passed in December 2019 and notified in January 2020, the absence of implementation rules had delayed its execution.

The move to notify the rules has renewed debate around the legislation, with supporters reiterating its humanitarian intent and critics restating concerns about discrimination and constitutional secularism, as previously highlighted by outlets such as BBC and Al Jazeera.