SciPost Submission Page
National Borders among Families: Removal and ‘Bare Life’ in India
by Salah Punathil
Submission summary
| Authors (as registered SciPost users): | Salah Punathil |
| Submission information | |
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| Preprint Link: | scipost_202401_00012v1 (pdf) |
| Date submitted: | 2024-01-13 07:10 |
| Submitted by: | Punathil, Salah |
| Submitted to: | Migration Politics |
| Ontological classification | |
|---|---|
| Academic field: | Political Science |
| Specialties: |
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Abstract
This paper is about the state-driven process of ‘migrant ‘illegality’ (Genova 2002) and its impact on the life of migrants in the Assam state of India. While the movement of people across borders between India and present-day Bangladesh has been historical and complex, this ethnographic work explores how the state-driven process of migrant illegality and the production of ‘bare life’ have disrupted intimate relations and family life among the migrant population in Assam. While the recent NRC (National Register of Citizens) update in Assam identified 1.9 million people as illegal migrants, there has been bureaucratic enactment of ‘migrant illegality’ by Assam Border Police for the last several years. The institutional procedures, court documents and narratives of the select cases of ‘detected’ as well as ‘detained’ migrants from ethnographic fieldwork reveal how the absence of formal papers and errors in the family records, kinship relations and property inheritance among the poor migrant families transforms actual citizens to ‘illegal migrants’ in the bureaucratic manoeuvring and reduces them to their ‘bare life’. The paper also shows how prejudice, arbitrariness, and contradictions feed into the bureaucratic process and lead to intense crises among family units, as several migrant families have both Indians and alleged ‘Bangladeshis’ in their homes today. The paper argues that the major consequence of this state-driven ‘migrant illegality’ in the last two decades has been the creation of national borders among families, unsettling intimate relations and shared spaces.
Current status:
Reports on this Submission
Strengths
The paper is very significant to migration and refugee studies. The author has made a good argument related to Agamben's bare life and the case of Assam India. The distinctive lies in the empirical study which interrogates familial sphere of those who have been left outside the ambit of citizenship.
Weaknesses
It would be great if the author is able to make an argument beyond bare life? Can this be pitched theoretically differently? Would it be possible to bring more discussion on citizenship and engage with differentiated understanding of citizenship.
Report
Yes it can published provided the author is able to go beyond bare life of Agamben? Overall it reads well, but not able to do justice to the empirical work conducted by the author.
Requested changes
Perhaps the author can be encourage to go beyond Agamben
Report 1 by Meghna Kajla on 2024-2-4 (Invited Report)
Strengths
The article makes a new pathway while explaining the familial and kinship bonds that are impacted due to changing Citizenship laws, the bureaucratic exercise of NRC, and migration in the state of Assam. The ethnographic details and interview excerpts very well complement the concepts used to demonstrate how intimate issues of marriage alliances, education for children of detainees, and their everyday healthcare remain invisible to the police authorities. The article is interesting in conducting ethnography to explore the anthropology of removal and bare life in the South Asian context. It finds that the South Asian state, specifically India endorsed confusing state policies to manage migration and citizenship in Assam and its long bureaucratic process of creating irregular citizenship.
Weaknesses
The author needs to distinguish between types of migrants and citizens in the context of Assam. Why has the author picked up this ethnicity needs to be explained. The Supreme Court orders require citations. While the focus of the article is on the NRC, it outlines that irregular citizenship is due to the internal policies of the state and turbulence in Assam for five decades. Thus, confusing whether bare lives come to appear due to one policy or is a regularity of the modern state.
Report
Yes, I would recommend the article to be published in this journal.
Requested changes
The article needs to situate the Bengali speaking Muslim community in the context of illegal and legal migrants because the concept of 'migrants' in Assam has a layered history. In doing this, it can clarify the suspicion behind this community of the state and distinguish between illegal, legal migrants, and citizens. As of now, they are intermingled. Last, the changing landscape of Indian politics, i.e., the rise in Hindutva nationalism further disturbs the social fabric of Assam and creates a Hindu-Muslim rift that requires attention.