Joseph Francis Pereira, a 78-year-old Christian from Pakistan, received an Indian citizenship certificate on Wednesday from Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, becoming the first person from the state to receive one under the updated Citizenship Act.
Pereira, who was born in Goa, studied in Pakistan prior to India’s independence and later became a citizen of that country. He spent several years working in Karachi before coming back to India in 2013. He was married to a Goan woman, but until the Modi administration changed the Citizenship Act in 2019, he had trouble getting Indian citizenship.
Passed in December 2019, the Citizenship (Amendment) Act bestows Indian status for persecuted non-Muslim migrants from Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Bangladesh who arrived in India prior to December 31, 2014. This encompasses Christians, Jains, Buddhists, Sikhs, Hindus, and Parsis.
