New research from Dr Maggie Paul explores how citizenship can be turned into an instrument of persecution against a country’s most vulnerable people.
Drawing on months of primary fieldwork at a courtroom in Mumbai, Dr Paul’s study highlights the impact of extended political securitisation of Bangladeshi labour migration as ‘infiltration’ in India on marginalised people who consider themselves to be citizens.
“The people I met endured years of hearings, imprisonment, financial ruin and the threat of family separation,” she says. “One woman was convicted after 52 hearings across three years, despite her husband and child being recognised as citizens. Another was pronounced an ‘infiltrator’ despite producing an array of state ID documentation, including a passport and government housing papers.”
Dr Paul refers to this as a ‘bordering practice’, where the border is not just a line on a map but something enacted daily by street-level officials deciding who belongs, ultimately leading to the legal transformation of citizens into migrants.
She says the findings serve as both a warning and an intervention.
“As India debates nationwide citizenship verification exercises, my research shows what happens when the burden of proving belonging falls on those least equipped to bear it.”
