Supreme Court agrees to hear 237 petitions against CAA on Tuesday

Tribune News Service

Satya Prakash

New Delhi, March 15

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to take up 237 petitions against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 and the recently notified CAA Rules on March 19.

A three-judge Bench led by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud said the petitions against the CAA will be heard along with interlocutory applications seeking a stay on the implementation of the CAA on Tuesday after senior counsel Kapil Sibal mentioned the matter on behalf of the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) -- one of the petitioners against the CAA.

He said when the CAA was passed in 2019, there was no question of stay as the Rules had not been notified.

"But now just before elections, the Rules have been notified. Please list it. If citizenship is granted now, then it cannot be reversed," Sibal submitted.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, however, said the fact that the rules were notified before elections was irrelevant. He also questioned the locus standi of the petitioners.

Even as the Government on March 11 notified the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024 to enable the persons eligible under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 to apply for the grant of Indian citizenship, 237 petitions challenging the amendment have remained pending before the top court since December 2019.

Passed by Parliament on December 11, 2019, the CAA was notified on January 10. It relaxes norms for grant of Indian citizenship by naturalization to Hindu, Sikh, Christian, Buddhist and Jain and Parsi victims of religious persecution from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh who came to India before December 31, 2014.

The top court had on January 22, 2020 refused to stay the operation of the CAA and the National Population Register (NPR) and said that ultimately a five-judge Bench might have to decide these issues. Acting on a transfer petition by the Central Government, it had restrained all high courts from passing any orders on the CAA.

The petitioners included Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra, Congress leader and former Union minister Jairam Ramesh, AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi, NGOs Rihai Manch and Citizens Against Hate, Assam Advocates’ Association and several law students. In 2020, the Kerala Government also filed a suit against the CAA.

Asserting that the CAA did not impinge upon any existing rights of citizens, the Centre had in March 2020 defended the law, saying there was no question of it violating constitutional morality which is not an "unruly horse".

In an affidavit filed in the top court, the Centre said it won’t affect the legal, democratic or secular rights of citizens and requested the court to dismiss petitions challenging it

"CAA does not impinge upon any existing right that may have existed prior to the enactment of the amendment and further, in no manner whatsoever, seeks to affect the legal, democratic or secular rights of any of the Indian citizens. The existing regime for obtaining citizenship of India by foreigners of any country is untouched by the CAA and remains the same," it said.

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