רישום - בן זוג של אזרח הודי בן 7

Three elements are required for §5(1)(c): (1) the applicant is married to a citizen of India; (2) the applicant is ordinarily resident in India for seven years before the application (operationalised by Explanation 1); and (3) the §5(1) chapeau conditions — not an illegal migrant (§2(1)(b)) and not already a citizen. A full-age applicant must take the Second Schedule oath of allegiance before registration (§5(2)), and the §5(3) prior-loss bar applies. The grant is discretionary under §14, without assigned reasons, and final subject to §15 revision. The residential requirement — but not the marriage requirement — may be exempted by the Central Government under §5(6) for a person or class, for reasons recorded in writing. On the primary text, clause (c) is gender-neutral ('a person who is married to a citizen of India'), so the route is available to a spouse of any gender married to an Indian citizen.

The foreign-national spouse of an Indian citizen applies to the Central Government in the prescribed manner for registration under §5(1)(c). The Central Government verifies the marriage to an Indian citizen and the seven-year ordinary residence (as deemed by Explanation 1), unless the residential requirement has been exempted under §5(6). If satisfied, it may register the applicant; the grant is discretionary under §14 and final subject to §15 revision. A full-age applicant must take the Second Schedule oath of allegiance before registration (§5(2)); on registration the person is a citizen by registration from the date of registration (§5(5)). The §5(3) prior-loss bar applies. Because registration confers full Indian citizenship and India does not permit dual citizenship (Constitution Art 9; §9), a successful spouse applicant must relinquish any foreign nationality, and later voluntary foreign acquisition auto-terminates Indian citizenship under §9(1). Government fees and timelines are operational figures not asserted here.

Section 5(1)(c) empowers the Central Government, on an application made in that behalf, to register as a citizen of India a person who is married to a citizen of India and is ordinarily resident in India for seven years before making the application. It is the marriage-based registration category and forms part of the §5(1) text substituted by Act 6 of 2004 (w.e.f. 3 December 2004); the same substitution raised the clause (a)/(c) residence figure from five years to seven years. The §5(1) chapeau conditions apply: the applicant must not be an illegal migrant (§2(1)(b)) and must not already be a citizen by virtue of the Constitution or the Act. Two features distinguish clause (c) from the other registration categories: first, Explanation 1 to §5(1) (the ordinary-residence deeming) applies to it because Explanation 1 governs 'clauses (a) and (c)'; second, §5(6) gives the Central Government a bespoke power to grant exemption from the residential requirement 'under clause (c)' for a person or class of persons, for reasons recorded in writing — an exemption available for the spouse route alone.