link for abstract submission: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScFPhqcIfUje5A_VuJjReJHlwjtc_Tz...

Seminar to be held in Hybrid ModeConcept Note:

Contemporary discourses on citizenship in South Asia gradually reveal a complex overlapping of legality, territory, and security. Moving beyond classical liberal notions, citizenship today is increasingly shaped by practices of bordering, surveillance, and anxiety of the State to monitor every movement. In this context, Professor Partha Chatterjee challenges the Western liberal view of universal citizenship, suggesting it does not fit the post-colonial context where political necessity forces the state to engage with illegal acts. Furthermore, Chatterjee’s perspective on the political society, explored in 'The Politics of the Governed' (2004) and 'Lineages of Political Society' (2011), offers a counter-narrative of how marginalized citizens reach the Indian state through indirect engagement, lying in the grey area between legality and illegality. As a matter of fact, this 'political society' which consists of a large marginalized population, forms the majority in Post-Colonial nations like India. 

During the making of the constitution of India, there have been strong debates regarding the nature of citizenship. The Constitution makers chose a relatively inclusive definitions, often revolving around 'jus soli' (by-birth citizenship). However, contemporary governance puts the 'jus sanguinis' (citizenship by descent) definition within increasing privilege, thereby narrowing down belonging to a permutation of lineage and accepted identity. This transition reflects the “bordering of citizenship”, a process wherein borders are not only geographical but are internalized within the polity, producing levels of citizenship putting a section of citizenry as a second class group . The triadic relationship between border, security, and citizenship is central to this transformation. Borders are no longer static demarcations but dynamic technologies of control, extending into everyday life. Security discourses justify this expansion, legitimizing surveillance and categorization, often turning into coercion.  

A Foucauldian perspective deepens this analysis by drawing parallels with the notion of the “mad citizen”, as observed in his magnum opus, "Madness and Civilization'. Just as modern power distinguishes between reason and madness to regulate populations, contemporary states differentiate between “trustworthy” and “suspect” citizens. Immigrants, in this context, are positioned as borderline subjects who are legally present yet perpetually scrutinized. Thus citizens today lay along fault lines of the shifting imperatives of the modern state, rather than a stable position of existence. Professor Samir Kumar Das, in his essay, "Wrestling with My Shadow", foregrounds this shift through the lens of securitization, where immigrant Muslims in West Bengal are not limited to being administrative subjects, having been recast as 'Potential Risks'. This shift in the reaction marks a departure from 'open citizenship' into a zone of territorially anchored and state mechanisms which has a deep mistrust towards its own citizens. The Conference tries to understand these contradictions, theorize the whims of the State, and the new normal idea of citizenship not only in India but across the globe.

The subtopics enlisted, but not limited to, are as follows:

Citizenship through the Indian Constitutional Lens

Citizenship and Marginality in India

The Gender Question in Indian Citizenship

Citizenship Redefined through Indian Anthropology

The South Asian Question in Citizenship

Indian Citizenship and Migration

Citizenship and Indian Ecology

Surveillance and Governance in Citizenship through the Lens of India

The Bengal Framework in Citizenship