On 13th February, the Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha made some important point with regards to the Hindu and Sikh refugees who have come to India from Afghanistan and Pakistan.
He told the House that in the absence of any authentic survey, the ‘accurate’ date of Sikh and Hindu refugees who came from Afghanistan and Pakistan during the last three years is not available.
Rijiju said that as per the data available in the online system, 1595 Pakistani and 391 Afghanistani migrants of all religions have been granted Indian Citizenship in the last 3 years (2016 to 2018).
Provision for capturing online citizenship data of migrants from minority communities namely Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian hailing from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh was introduced in 2018.
As per the available data, 295 Hindus and Sikhs from Afghanistan and Pakistan have been granted Indian Citizenship since then.
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Several Hindus and Sikhs have come to India from Pakistan and Afghanistan citing religious persecution from Muslim-majority (ranging from land grabbing, Islamic tax of Non-Muslims, and blasphemy against Islam).