Goa-Born Christian Pak Man Seeks Citizenship Under CAA, Top Court Says...

The Supreme Court has refused to entertain an appeal from a Goa-born Pakistani Catholic man, who sought a direction to the Centre to grant him citizenship under the Citizenship Amendment Act or CAA, citing religious persecution in Pakistan. The court has asked him to approach the Bombay High Court for relief. 

Jude Mendes -- a chef at a restaurant in Goa -- had come to India six years after the CAA's cut-off date of January 2014.

The 38-year-old was born in Goa to a Pakistani national in 1987 but migrated soon after and completed his studies in Karachi, Pakistan. He came to India in 2016 on a long-term visa, which has been extended till June 20. 

In 2020, he got his Aadhaar and married an Indian woman in February. 

India had cancelled all visas given to Pakistani nationals on April 25, three days after the Pahalgam terror attack on tourists by Pakistan-backed terrorists. But the long-term visa held by Mendes has not been cancelled. 

Advocate Raghav Awasthi told a partial working day bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Manmohan that "the petitioner is born in India and is a Roman Catholic, who is highly persecuted in Pakistan due to being a minority community".

Mr Mendes, he said, cannot go to Pakistan to renew his passport, which is expiring on June 20, as there is a threat to his life. So he should be granted extension of his long-term visa, the advocate contended.

The petitioner has said that his Indian birth and marriage to an Indian citizen may endanger his life due to extreme religious persecution in Pakistan.

The bench, however, said he would have to approach the Bombay High Court for relief. 

Under the CAA, India has pledged to grant citizenship to people of minority communities who have been persecuted on basis of religion in neighbouring countries. The law, however, provides that they should have entered India before January 1, 2014.