By Cedric Prakash
Ahmedabad, June 21, 2026: We have celebrated ‘World Refugee Day’ once again! It is a day on which all of us are called to remember and to honour the strength, courage and resilience of people who have been forced to flee their home country to escape conflict or persecution.
The day is important because it shines a light on the rights, needs and dreams of refugees, helps to mobilize political will and resources so refugees can not only survive but thrive.
This special day was first established on 20 June 2001, in recognition of the 50th anniversary of the 1951 UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees.
The Refugee Convention was adopted on 28 July 1951, with some twenty nations being the original signatories. So this year marks its 75th year!
Today,149 countries have signed the Refugee Convention & its 1967 Protocol which followed. Adopted in the aftermath of two devastating world wars, the Convention was born from a determination never again to abandon those fleeing persecution and violence.
Seventy-five years ago, after the Second World War, the world made a promise for everyone’s benefit: People forced to flee have the right to seek and live in safety. It was never meant for a few. It was meant for every single person on planet earth. 75 years down the road, its relevance has never been clearer.
According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), 117.8 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide at the end of 2025 – roughly one in every seventy people on the planet.
The theme this year is ‘Until Everyone is Safe’; a reminder that safety is not a privilege reserved for the few but a fundamental right: the right to life and to a life lived in dignity.
For as long as people are forced to flee conflict, climate change or persecution, our shared responsibility endures. But safety is not just the absence of violence. It means legal protection, shelter, health care, education, the right to work, and the chance to rebuild and live in dignity.
No one is safe until the most vulnerable among us are. Protecting refugees helps communities thrive, creates stability and saves lives.
In times like these, we hold onto the promise of safety, dignity and rights. We also renew our commitment to helping refugees move beyond survival towards a future of rights, solutions, dignity and hope.
The 1951 Convention contains a number of rights and also highlights the obligations of refugees towards their host country. The cornerstone of the 1951 Convention is the principle of ‘non-refoulement’.
According to this principle, a refugee should not be returned to a country where he or she faces serious threats to his or her life or freedom.
This protection may not be claimed by refugees who are reasonably regarded as a danger to the security of the country, or having been convicted of a particularly serious crime, are considered a danger to the community.
The rights contained in the 1951 Convention include:
• The right not to be expelled, except under certain, strictly defined conditions;
• The right not to be punished for illegal entry into the territory of a contracting State;
• The right to work;
• The right to housing;
• The right to education;
• The right to public relief and assistance;
• The right to freedom of religion;
• The right to access the courts;
• The right to freedom of movement within the territory;
• The right to be issued identity and travel documents.
Some basic rights, including the right to be protected from refoulement, apply to all refugees. A refugee becomes entitled to other rights the longer they remain in the host country, which is based on the recognition that the longer they remain as refugees, the more rights they need.
The Church has always taken an unequivocal stand for refugees. Pope Francis has spared no opportunity to highlight the plight of refugees and why we should welcome, protect, promote and integrate them.
Pope Leo XIV has continued the legacy of Pope Francis with his in his recent pastoral visit to Spain, Pope Leo spoke about refugees often; he also visited the Canary Islands where we spoke to and met several refugees.
In his first encyclical ‘Magnifica Humanitas’ (May 15, 2026) Pope Leo says, “a litmus test for social justice today is the treatment of migrants, refugees and those forced to move due to poverty, violence, climate change and environmental disasters.
“The way a society treats them reveals whether its sense of justice is driven by fear or by the spirit of fraternity. Pope Francis urged us to see migrants not simply as a problem to be managed, but as a living image of the People of God on the move.”
In the past, India took great pride of putting into practise that Sanskrit phrase from the Maha Upanishad ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam’ (‘the world is one family’)’ It was perhaps in our DNA to welcome and provide hospitality to the stranger.
In the past, we have great visionary leaders who epitomised what welcome, hospitality and protection is all about! Gone are the days when Nehru welcomed the Tibetans; Indira Gandhi, the Bangladeshis and Rajiv Gandhi, the Tamils.
We fare very badly today, as a nation, in our treatment to refugees. India is not a signatory to the Refugee Convention.
Today xenophobia, jingoism, false-nationalism and exclusivism seems to have become the order of the day! The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) are blatant examples of how Muslims are targeted and regarded as ‘foreigners’.
Besides discrimination is institutionalised. This is clearly written all over particularly when one looks at the way the minorities, the Adivasis, the Dalits, the poor and the vulnerable like the migrant workers and even refugees like the Rohingyas are being treated in this country.
In Ahmedabad, thousands of poor Muslims had their homes demolished because they were ‘suspected’ to be Bangla deshis!
Last October, in a message for the 111th Day of Migrants and Refugees, Pope Leo XIV said, “In a world darkened by war and injustice, even when all seems lost, migrants and refugees stand as messengers of hope.
Their courage and tenacity bear heroic testimony to a faith that sees beyond what our eyes can see and gives them the strength to defy death on the various contemporary migration routes.”
The key question/s then for each one of us today: do we have the courage to stand in solidarity with the refugees? to accompany them to a more just, equitable, fraternal and humane life? to be there with them … until everyone is safe?
Jesuit Father Cedric Prakash is a human rights, reconciliation & peace activist and writer. Contact: cedricprakash@gmail.com.
(Photo: CC BY 2.0)