CAA deadline: India extends cut-off to 2024, easing path to citizenship for persecuted minorities

New Delhi: The Government of India has extended the cut-off date for entry under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) to December 31, 2024, allowing members of persecuted minority communities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan — Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians — to stay in India even without valid travel documents. This follows a notification issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and comes as a major relief for individuals who fled religious persecution but entered India after the previous 2014 deadline.

According to the CAA, which came into force last year, non-Muslim migrants from the three neighbouring countries who entered India on or before December 31, 2014 due to religious persecution were eligible for Indian citizenship. However, with continued cross-border migration of persecuted minorities, the cut-off has now been extended by a decade.

A new order issued under the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025, exempts eligible individuals from the requirement of holding a valid passport or visa. As per the Home Ministry directive, "A person belonging to a minority community in Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan — Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians — who were compelled to seek shelter in India due to religious persecution or fear of religious persecution and entered the country on or before December 31, 2024 without valid documents, including a passport or other travel documents, or with valid documents, including a passport or other travel documents, and the validity of such documents have expired" will be exempted from the rule of possessing a valid passport and visa.

The Citizenship (Amendment) Act was passed by Parliament in December 2019 and signed into law by then President Ram Nath Kovind. The Act aims to fast-track Indian citizenship for undocumented non-Muslim migrants fleeing religious persecution in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The Central Government formally implemented the law on March 11 last year by notifying the necessary rules, nearly four years after its passage. The latest extension follows longstanding appeals from refugee associations, including a body representing displaced persons from Bangladesh, which had urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to revise the cut-off to reflect the ongoing influx of minority refugees.

Union Minister of State for Education Sukanta Majumdar shared the updated notification dated September 1, through his official X handle. The move is expected to benefit a large number of migrants, particularly Hindus from Pakistan, who entered India after 2014 and had been living in legal uncertainty.