{"id":77755,"date":"2026-06-25T18:01:43","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T12:31:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=77755"},"modified":"2026-06-25T18:02:36","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T12:32:36","slug":"passport-citizenship-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/25-06-2026\/passport-citizenship-india","title":{"rendered":"Passport Not a Proof of Citizenship: MEA"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/Citizenship<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has clarified that an<strong> Indian passport is strictly a travel document <\/strong>and should <strong>not be treated as conclusive proof of citizenship.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>About<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>An Indian passport is an official travel document issued by the<strong> Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It <strong>serves as proof of the holder&#8217;s identity<\/strong> and nationality for international travel and enables access to consular assistance abroad.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>An ePassport is a combined paper and electronic passport with a <strong>Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Chip<\/strong> and an antenna embedded as an inlay of passport that contains the personal particulars and biometric information of the passport holder.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>They are designed in accordance with the <strong>International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)<\/strong> standards for biometric travel documents.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Citizenship<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Citizenship is listed in the<strong> Union List under the Constitution <\/strong>and thus is <strong>under the exclusive jurisdiction of Parliament.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The Constitution<strong> does not define the term \u2018citizen\u2019 but details of various categories<\/strong> of persons who are entitled to citizenship are given in <strong>Part II (Articles 5 to 11).<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Acquisition of Indian Citizenship<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <strong>Citizenship Act of 1955 <\/strong>prescribes five ways of acquiring citizenship:\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Citizenship conferred by birth;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Citizenship through descent;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Citizenship through registration;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Naturalization leads to citizenship;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Territorial incorporation (by the Government of India).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Under The<strong> Indian Citizenship Act, 1955<\/strong>,<strong> Persons of Indian Origin are not allowed dual citizenship<\/strong>.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>If a person has ever held an Indian passport and has obtained the passport of another country, they are required to immediately surrender their Indian passport.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Termination of Indian Citizenship<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Renunciation:<\/strong> Any Indian citizen who is also a national of another country who renounces his Indian citizenship in the prescribed manner through a declaration ceases to be an Indian citizen.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Termination:<\/strong> An Indian citizen&#8217;s citizenship can be revoked if he or she knowingly or voluntarily adopts the citizenship of another country.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Deprivation<\/strong>: In some cases, the Indian government may deprive a person of his citizenship. However, this does not apply to all citizens. Conditions for deprivation are:\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Obtained the citizenship by fraud.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Citizens have shown disloyalty to the Constitution of India.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Citizens have unlawfully traded or communicated during the times of war.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Within 5 years of naturalization, the said citizen is imprisoned for a term of two years.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Citizen has been ordinarily resident out of India for a period of 7 years.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/india\/passport-travel-document-not-proof-of-citizenship-mea-10755656\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>IE<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong> Context <\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has clarified that an Indian passport is strictly a travel document and should not be treated as conclusive proof of citizenship. <\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong> About <\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> An Indian passport is an official travel document issued by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).\u00a0 <\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> It serves as proof of the holder&#8217;s identity and nationality for international travel and enables access to consular assistance abroad.\u00a0 <\/li>\n<p><a href=\" https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/25-06-2026\/passport-citizenship-india \" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77755"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77758,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77755\/revisions\/77758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}