Article 35A of the Indian Constitution was an article that
empowered the Jammu and Kashmir state's legislature to define "permanent residents" of the state and provide special rights and privileges to them. It was added to the Constitution through a presidential order, i.e., The Constitution (Application to Jammu and Kashmir) Order, 1954 – issued by the President of India under Article 370. The state of Jammu and Kashmir defined these privileges to include the ability to purchase land and immovable property, ability to vote and contest elections, seeking government employment and availing oneself of other state benefits such as higher education and health care. Non-permanent residents of the state, even if Indian citizens, were not entitled to these 'privileges'.
The provisions facilitated by the Article 35A and the state's permanent resident laws have been criticised over the years for their discriminatory nature, including the hardships imposed on immigrant workers, refugees from West Pakistan, and the State's own female residents, who could lose their permanent resident status by marrying out of state.
On 5 August 2019, the President of India Ram Nath Kovind issued a new Presidential Order, whereby all the provisions of the Indian Constitution were made to apply to the State without any special provisions. This implied that the State's separate Constitution stood inoperative, including the privileges allowed by the Article 35A.
Background
Prior to 1947, Jammu and Kashmir was a princely state under the British Paramountcy. The people of the princely states were "state subjects", not British colonial subjects. In the case of Jammu and Kashmir, the political movements in the state in the early 20th century led to the emergence of "hereditary state subject" as a political identity for the State's people. In particular, the Pandit community had launched a "Kashmir for the Kashmiris" movement demanding that only Kashmiris should be employed in state government jobs. Legal provisions for the recognition of the status were enacted by the Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir between 1912 and 1932. The 1927 Hereditary State Subject Order granted to the state subjects the right to government office and the right to land use and ownership, which were not available to non-state subjects.
With the 1927 order, one could become a state subject under class III after 10 years of permanent residence. Another order was given on June 27, 1932, which reiterated the 10 year demand for "foreign nationals".
Following the accession of Jammu and Kashmir to the Indian Union on 26 October 1947, The Maharaja ceded control over defence, external affairs and communications (the 'ceded subjects') to the Government of India . The Article 370 of the Constitution of India and the concomitant Constitutional Order of 1950 formalised this relationship. Discussions for furthering the relationship between the State and the Union continued, culminating in the 1952 Delhi Agreement, whereby the governments of the State and the Union agreed that Indian citizenship would be extended to all the residents of the state but the state would be empowered to legislate over the rights and privileges of the state subjects, who would now be called permanent residents.
In his statement to the Lok Sabha on the Delhi agreement, Nehru has said:The question of citizenship arose obviously. Full citizenship applies there. But our friends from Kashmir were very apprehensive about one or two matters. For a long time past, in the Maharaja's time, there had been laws there preventing any outsider, that is, any person from outside Kashmir, from acquiring or holding land in Kashmir. If I mention it, in the old days the Maharaja was very much afraid of a large number of Englishmen coming and settling down there, because the climate is delectable, and acquiring property. So although most of their rights were taken away from the Maharaja under the British rule, the Maharaja stuck to this that nobody from outside should acquire land there. And that continues. So the present Government of Kashmir is very anxious to preserve that right because they are afraid, and I think rightly afraid, that Kashmir would be overrun by people whose sole qualification might be the possession of too much money and nothing else, who might buy up, and get the delectable places. Now they want to vary the old Maharaja's laws to liberalise it, but nevertheless to have checks on the acquisition of lands by persons from outside. However, we agree that this should be cleared up. The old state's subjects definition gave certain privileges regarding this acquisition of land, the services, and other minor things, I think, State scholarships and the rest.