Post
by Dawie » Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:10 pm
Firstly, you lost your Indian citizenship the moment you aquired French citizenship. There is no need to renounce your Indian citizenship because you are already no longer an Indian citizen! Congratulations.
Secondly, why do you want to apply for ILR in the UK if you have just aquired French citizenship which allows you live here unrestricted for as long as you want? The only reasons I can think of are if you want to aquire British citizenship, or you want your children or dependents to aquire British citizenship.
Unfortunately from what you have described, you don't qualify for ILR either as an Indian citizen or as a French citizen.
You don't qualify as an Indian citizen because you are no longer an Indian citizen, and even if you were you don't fulfil the requirements for ILR under the 10 year rule because you haven't been here in the UK for 10 years yet. Although this is a moot point because you are no longer an Indian citizen.
You don't qualify for ILR as French citizen either, because in order for an EU citizen to obtain ILR in the UK they have to have lived here for 5 years. Although you seem to have lived in the UK for 5 years, it was under your Indian passport and not your French passport, so your ILR clock only started ticking when you aquired your French citizenship.
In any case, be happy, you have an EU passport and you can live anywhere in the EU for as long as you like. There's really no need to get ILR in the UK unless, as I said, you or your dependants want to eventually become British citizens. If this is the case, then you have 5 years to wait until you get ILR and then another year of living here as a holder of ILR before you can apply for British citizenship.
In a few years time we'll look back on immigration control like we look back on American prohibition in the thirties - futile and counter-productive.
