The dream of greener pastures that some Goans sought via a maroon-coloured passport always had an amber light flashing a warning of the perils of dual citizenship, but that was disregarded as the bright future in EU overshadowed the concerns. Yet, there was never a doubt that it would ricochet some day and that day appears to have arrived.
Goans who opted for Portuguese citizenship but held on to their Indian passports and who sought to surrender the latter after the stipulated period have had their Indian travel document revoked. But it goes beyond those surrendering passports, as the Government of India is establishing date of acquiring Portuguese citizenship as the date on which the assento de nascimento (birth registration in Lisbon) has been granted to the individual. Rightly so.
This is the crucial aspect, for what a large number of those few Goans who sought Portuguese citizenship did was convince themselves, despite evidence to the contrary, that the passport is proof of citizenship and so went ahead and got their births registered in Portugal, obtaining the assento de nascimento and then went on to even apply and get the bilhete de identidade (identity card) or the cartão de cidadão (citizen’s card) that is replacing the bilhete de identidade.
It is actually commonsense, and does not require a legally-trained mind, to realise that the registration of one’s birth in Portugal effectively made that person a Portuguese citizen. The warning light was that India does not recognise dual citizenship and from that stemmed the fact that anybody seeking and obtaining Portuguese citizenship would automatically cease to be Indian.
News has now trickled in that in the last few months the Passport Office has revoked the Indian passports of those who possessed the assento de nascimento and had not, within the stipulated time, surrendered their Indian passports but come to the office to do so at a much later date.
Does this finally lay to rest the debate on whether a Portuguese bilhete de identidade also known as BI or the assento de nascimento is proof of Portuguese nationality? Many of those living in denial and basing arguments that the passport is confirmation of nationality still appear to be living in that same denial mode.
Having said that, this is a complicated issue with no simple solution and has a backstory that would require reams of paper to even succinctly explain, but alas, one does not have that luxury of space or even time for that.
Making an effort to bring that history into perspective in brief, after Liberation on December 19, 1961, the Constitution (Twelfth Amendment) was enacted on March 27, 1962 bringing Goa, Daman and Diu in the list of Union Territories, and extending Indian laws, including the Citizenship Act of 1955, the Foreigners Act 1946 and the Registration of Foreigners Act 1939 to Goa.
Additionally, the Goa Daman and Diu (Citizenship) Order 1962 was promulgated stating that every person, or whose parents or grandparents were born before December 20, 1961, in Goa, Daman and Diu, shall be deemed to have become a citizen of India provided that he doesn’t make a written declaration to the administrator of Goa, Daman and Diu stating that he chooses to retain the citizenship or nationality he had immediately before December 20, 1961.
Simultaneously, Portugal refused to recognise India’s sovereignty over Goa and even ran a government in exile from Lisbon and it was only in December 1974, after the overthrow of the dictatorship in Portugal that diplomatic relations were established between the two countries. At that time, neither was the citizenship issue discussed nor was the law granting Goans born before 1961 or their descendants up to two generations the right to Portuguese citizenship repealed by Portugal.
The question being hotly debated these last few days since the expose in The Goan, however, is on the 'assento de nascimento' as proof of Portuguese citizenship. To me there was never a doubt on this and twice in the past – in 2013 and then in 2015 – I have stated this, in published articles in Goan dailies citing Portuguese books and quoting legal experts.
To further reinforce, this, I would like to fall back upon Miguel Reis, a Portuguese lawyer and former journalist who, in his book ‘Portuguese Citizenship of Persons Born in the Erstwhile ‘Estado da India’ and of their Descendants’, writes, “Base XLVIII of the Law No. 2098, of 29 July 1959, stipulated that the Portuguese nationality of persons born in the Portuguese territory is proved by the entries in the settled record of birth.” Reis adds that the “current Law of Nationality (Law No. 37/81, of 3 October 1981) contains a corresponding provision in art. 21st”. From the above he concludes that, “From this it is realised, with elementary ease, that the Portuguese nationality can be proved only through a certificate of the settled record (or assento) of birth obtained from the Portuguese civil registry….” That is a conclusion that flows logically.
There are more references to this in the book, reiterations mainly, but this is proof enough from an expert that the assento de nascimento is the document that makes one a citizen of Portugal.
Since the topic under discussion is on the assento de nascimento as proof of Portuguese citizenship, I will not dwell on how Goans came to acquire this right of claiming Portuguese citizenship. Reis, and the book’s translator Ave Cleto Afonso, have covered this in detail. In fact, in his in-depth introduction, Afonso, under the subheading ‘Sequence of events & historic-legal setting’ lists how this has flowed right from 1510 till the introduction of the Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) card in 2004. For those holding Portuguese nationality, the OCI card is of significant importance.
It is extremely clear that Indian nationals who have acquired Portuguese citizenship, but still retain their Indian passport, are holding dual citizenship. It was to be expected that the Indian government would someday step in to stop this. But the bigger question was always whether registration of birth in Portugal – the assento de nascimento – meant that the person possessed Portuguese citizenship or not.
Portugal of course had no disagreement on this, neither now nor earlier. Now, India too appears to have no dispute on the same. That flashing amber light has therefore turned to red. At least now, will those who have registered their births in Portugal realise the implications of that deed? It is no point living in denial on this. There could be quite a number of people in Goa who have acquired the assento de nascimento and the matter, even if it defies an easy solution, requires some consideration in India.
