A LITTLE over two years ago, a petition seeking to determine the status of foreigners who have taken up Indian citizenship was filed in the Supreme Court by the Rashtriya Mukti Morcha. The petition had earlier been rejected by the Delhi High Court seemingly because no cause of action was apparent. The SC admitted it considering the importance of the question involved. But what has followed leaves much to be desired. The Times of India (dated August 5, 2007) carried an article titled - ‘EC avoids issue of Sonia’s foreign origin’. According to the article, the EC, in response to an SC notice specifically asking it to comment on the status of those foreigners who were citizens of India by registration, submitted an affidavit stating, “It is respectfully submitted that the EC has no comment to offer on this constitutional question as it does not pertain to conduct of election or disqualification of candidate.”

It further said certain things which were not only uncalled for but which showed both the incompetence of the counsel it had engaged and its own tendency to disown issues of national importance which as will be shown subsequently, directly fall in its exclusive domain. The response of the counsel for the petitioner makes one shudder to think what will ultimately happen not on this particular issue alone, but on other national issues.

Now the questions that the EC must answer are:
* What makes it conclude that the question does not pertain to disqualification of a candidate?
* Where does it look for the qualification ratings of the candidates?
* Is it aware of an enactment titled ‘The Indian Citizenship Act, 1955'?

If in response to the first question it says that since the Congress President was not disqualified earlier, it presumed that it must not be pertaining to it, it is in error. Because what had been happening in the past was based on the myth spread by some columnists with or without vested interests, that the Constitution of India is silent on the subject of foreigners and because an issue, which is entirely a matter of interpretation of the statute and which if anything concerns national security, not something which can ever be person-specific, was turned into a political and person-specific one. As regards to looking for the QRs the EC should have looked in, and the SC may now, if it is so pleased look in to Article 58(1)(a) and an identical entry in Article 66 read along with Article 9 of the Constitution.

The author has refrained from reproducing the said content lest it give an impression that he is trying to predispose a case being presently heard by the Apex Court. As regards the last question, the EC must not only know about it but also this - that this statute is the one that has been specifically enacted to deal with cases of the nature under discussion. And it is very much the duty of the EC to ensure that every person in India who is not an Indian by birth is extended exactly the same courtesy as an Indian receives in the country to which such person belonged, no more no less. If the information given in ‘Letters to Editor’ can be relied upon, then one had appeared in ‘The Pioneer’ prior to Lok Sabha elections in 2004, with the heading ‘How’s she contesting?’ and telling about an Indian in Italy not being allowed to contest even in a municipal election. And the EC must also know that offering ‘reciprocal treatment’ is a mandatory and statutory requirement linked with an Indian’s fundamental rights to equality, which a sovereign nation cannot secure beyond its territory hence begs of no precedence. So even while the EC awaits the SC’s ruling, it can still disqualify Sonia Gandhi from contesting election to the 15th Lok Sabha and proceed now or after the final ruling to amend the records of previous Lok Sabhas to remove any traces of precedent(s).

On April 14, 2004, the EC had debarred one Jayant Singh, incidentally a grandson of former PM Choudhary Charan Singh, from contesting in an assembly election because he was holding a British passport and therefore as per Article 9, was not a citizen of India. This gives a macabre picture of the EC. It will debar only Indians who default as per Article 9 and say or do nothing about outright foreigners. And it says so in a forum as high as the SC and no one notices. Can anything be more absurd than this - that an Indian in India is inferior to a foreigner? Indians must be the only people in the world with no sense of belonging, self-respect, identity or nationality.