Abstract:
While most refugee communities aspire for citizenship in the host country, the Tibetan refugees in India have traditionally desisted from assimilation and citizenship. Under Indian law, anyone born between January 26, 1950 and July 1, 1987 on Indian soil is automatically an Indian citizen. This was quoted to include Tibetans by a Delhi High Court in its decision on 22 December 2010. Through extensive interviews and interactions with Tibetans in various Tibetans settlements in India, as well as a review of secondary data, this paper tries to understand the challenges that citizenship brings to one of the most successful nations in exile.
