The Lok Sabha a little past midnight on Tuesday passed the Citizenship Bill that seeks to provide Indian citizenship to non-Muslim refugees coming from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan after facing religious persecution back home.

The Bill, passed after a heated debate lasting over seven hours with 311 members favouring it and 80 voting against it, will now be tabled in the Rajya Sabha.

The proposed legislation aims to protect refugees from facing proceedings of illegal immigration. The cut-off date for citizenship is December 31, 2014, meaning the applicant should have entered India on or before that date. Indian citizenship, under present law, is given either to those born in India or anyone residing here for a minimum 11 years.

Calling it “regressive”, a united Opposition favoured grant of rights to Hindus and other communities, but opposed leaving persecuted Muslims out of the Bill’s ambit. Sukhbir Singh Badal of the Akali Dal, a BJP ally, also sought that persecuted Muslims be included. Some parties questioned leaving out minorities from Myanmar and Sri Lanka.

Home Minister Amit Shah, in his reply to the debate, said there was no political agenda behind the Bill and that it was only a constitutional process to give citizenship to those denied basic civil rights. “The Bill does not violate any Article of the Constitution. It does not affect any Muslim in India…. The National Register of Citizens will be implemented across the country,” said Shah.

Congress leader in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chaudhary said his party was not opposing inclusion of persecuted Hindus or other minorities, but was against the exclusion of people of one religion . Earlier in the day, Congress MP Manish Tewari, opening the arguments for his party, countered Shah who had said the Congress was responsible for Partition on the basis of religion. “I want to make it clear that the foundation for the two-nation theory was laid at a Hindu Mahasabha session in 1935 in Ahmedabad by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, and not by the Congress,” said Tewari. Shah did not counter Tewari’s Savarkar remark, but asked why the Congress accepted the division on religious lines.