In a decision that may allow families to reconnect, government has reviewed the Adverse List containing as many as 314 blacklisted foreign nationals from the Sikh community and brought it down to just two.
The government says this review is a continuous and dynamic process and a part of a regular exercise.
“There was a demand from many Sikh organisations. So we reviewed the list and now, all those Sikh foreign nationals who were earlier debarred now can visit India, meet their family members and reconnect to their roots,” a senior government functionary told media.
In the 1980s, many Sikh Indian nationals were placed in this category for promoting anti-India sentiments. At that time, several Sikh Indians left the country to escape Indian authorities, sought asylum outside India and took citizenship in other countries.
The Union Home Ministry had earlier announced that it has put an end to the local adverse lists, commonly known as ‘black lists’ of Indian-origin people.
“As one of the major issue coming in the way of grant of consular or visa services to asylum seekers and their family members, mostly belonging to Sikh community, was maintenance of local adverse lists by Indian Missions. This practice was discontinued,” an officer said.
All Indian missions and posts abroad have also been advised to grant “appropriate visa to all categories of asylees” and family members whose names do not figure in the Central Adverse List. This will be done in line with the procedure followed for other categories of applicants of that nationality.
Not just that, all categories of asylees who were blacklisted in a way for a long time, will also now be eligible to apply for registration as Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) cardholders. But this can only happen after they have applied for and held normal visas for a period of two years, said the government.