The great citizenship conundrum
When we R2I next year my family will face a very unique problem. The parents are Indian Citizens but the kids are US citizens. Citizenship rules in India and US are structured in a way that such dichotomy in Indian families working in USA will become more common. Here's how it works.
US Side:
Anyone who was born in US soil is a US citizen. USA allows you to hold multiple citizenry. Anyone born in USA is not eligible for any type of visas as by default they are citizens. One must be atleast 18 years of age to renounce US citizenry. So those are the basic ground rules as for as US citizenship is concerned.
India Side:
India does not recognize dual citizenship. Either you are an Indian citizen or not. Ofcourse there's the usual mayajal type of schemes like OCI(Overseas citizens of India) and PIO(Person of Indian Origin). If you have parents who are Indian citizens and your citizenship is acquired involuntarily (which is the case for all Indian kids born in USA) then you can claim Indian citizenship after living in India for 5 years continuously. Those are the ground rules for Indian citizenship.
While these rules are structured in a way that makes sense for their national interest, it really doesn't work well in today's flat world. There are hundreds of thousands of Indians working in USA. If they are going to bite the bullet and go through the horrendous employment based immigration process (which is hopelessly broken) and finally get US Citizenship then they are fine. But if you are like me who is frustrated with this process to such an extent that we are R2I-ing early next year you face the interesting problem of parents being ICs and kids being USCs.
The problem arises because neither India nor USA have taken in to account the changed scenario in international travel where people visit other countries on temporary purposes and such temporary purposes can be even for a decade or more.
So a child born to ICs in USA automatically and involuntarily assumes USC. But if the parents decide to relocate to India, due to any reason, neither the parents nor the child can officially renounce the kids US citizenship in order to acquire Indian citizenship because the child needs to be atleast 18 years to make a conscientious choice. Very good thought behind this rule but another case of practical realities leapfrogging those ancient laws.
US Side:
Anyone who was born in US soil is a US citizen. USA allows you to hold multiple citizenry. Anyone born in USA is not eligible for any type of visas as by default they are citizens. One must be atleast 18 years of age to renounce US citizenry. So those are the basic ground rules as for as US citizenship is concerned.
India Side:
India does not recognize dual citizenship. Either you are an Indian citizen or not. Ofcourse there's the usual mayajal type of schemes like OCI(Overseas citizens of India) and PIO(Person of Indian Origin). If you have parents who are Indian citizens and your citizenship is acquired involuntarily (which is the case for all Indian kids born in USA) then you can claim Indian citizenship after living in India for 5 years continuously. Those are the ground rules for Indian citizenship.
While these rules are structured in a way that makes sense for their national interest, it really doesn't work well in today's flat world. There are hundreds of thousands of Indians working in USA. If they are going to bite the bullet and go through the horrendous employment based immigration process (which is hopelessly broken) and finally get US Citizenship then they are fine. But if you are like me who is frustrated with this process to such an extent that we are R2I-ing early next year you face the interesting problem of parents being ICs and kids being USCs.
The problem arises because neither India nor USA have taken in to account the changed scenario in international travel where people visit other countries on temporary purposes and such temporary purposes can be even for a decade or more.
So a child born to ICs in USA automatically and involuntarily assumes USC. But if the parents decide to relocate to India, due to any reason, neither the parents nor the child can officially renounce the kids US citizenship in order to acquire Indian citizenship because the child needs to be atleast 18 years to make a conscientious choice. Very good thought behind this rule but another case of practical realities leapfrogging those ancient laws.
posted by Karthik S at
8:20 PM
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