of being able to attain the full British citizenship that was promised to them. Chinese nationality A small proportion of Indians have availed themselves of naturalisation as Chinese citizens, which according to law can be requested by any Hong Kong permanent resident who has Chinese relatives, who has settled there, or who has other legitimate reasons, and who is willing to renounce all foreign citizenships. The Nationality Law of the People's Republic of China began to apply in the HKSAR when it was established on 1 July 1997 in accord with Hong Kong Basic Law Article 18 and Annex III, with some differences from the application of the same law in mainland China, due to explanations of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. That put the Immigration Department in charge of administering the Nationality Law within the SAR. Although China did not agree to a blanket grant of citizenship to South Asians settled in Hong Kong, it empowered the Hong Kong Immigration Department to naturalise Hong Kong residents as Chinese citizens. Prior to 2002, the Hong Kong Immigration Department discouraged South Asians and other ethnic minorities from taking this course, with immigration officers reportedly refusing to even give them the forms to fill in (thus they would not show up in rejection statistics). It took until December 2002 to see the first case of successful naturalisation application by an ethnic minority resident with no Chinese relatives, an Indian girl, followed by a Pakistani man. Other high-profile South Asians such as aspiring politician Abdull Ghafar Khan and the wife of Gill Mohindepaul Singh have continued to experience rejections of their naturalisation applications as well, leading to an August 2012 letter of concern from then-Equal Opportunities Commissioner Eden Lam to the Immigration Department. Several affected South Asian residents contacted their legislators seeking relief, leading to a Legislative Council question later that year by Claudia Mo of the Civic Party to Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok. Lai's response revealed that from July 1997 to November 2012, Pakistanis and Indians formed more than half of the applicants for naturalisation and had an approval rate higher than Vietnamese or Filipinos, but far lower than the applicant pool excluding those four groups. Immigration Department statistics provided to the Legislative Council at various times show that from July 1997 to April 2005, only 552 Indian citizens applied for naturalisation as Chinese citizens, while from May