Refugee Rights and National Security: Reconciling Humanitarian Obligations with State Sovereignty in India

Protecting refugees is a complicated legal and policy problem since it necessitates the State to strike a balance between humanitarian duties with regard to protection of those who have fled persecution, conflict and severe human-rights abuses of their sovereign duty to control entry, presence and removal of foreigners. India stands in a unique place regarding the protection of refugees internationally. India is the country that, despite being historically the shelter of great numbers of refugees, is not Part of the Convention of 1951 on the status of refugees and the 1967 Protocol and, decades after that, lacked an overall domestic refugee law. The way of governance was therefore to a great extent based on executive policy and the courts and in general laws of immigration to govern the refugees. The adoption and the coming into effect of the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025 has streamlined and unified the Indian immigration system, yet it is not a full-fledged refugee-protection system. The relationship between refugee rights, national security and State sovereignty in India is critically analyzed in this paper. It also examines constitutional guarantees of Articles 14 and 21, the doctrine of non-refue, international law of India and the policy of non-refuge by the executive and the new statutory framework within the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025. Special consideration is brought to the decisions of the courts. The paper concludes by arguing that national security is a constitutional and justifiable State interest, but cannot be used as an opportunity to treat refugees to arbitrary or indiscriminate treatment. India needs refugee regime based on rights, including the screening of security, personal evaluation, procedural protections, temporary protection and judicial checks and balances. This sort of framework can guard the sovereignty of India and at the same time the humanitarian duties and basic rights are not compromised.