Top court seeks Centre’s response on fresh pleas challenging CAA
New Delhi, India - The Supreme Court on Monday posted for hearing on October 31 a batch of petitions challenging the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019 and sought the Centre’s response on some fresh pleas.
A bench of Chief Justice of India UU Lalit and Justice S Ravindra Bhat observed it would refer the CAA case for hearing to a three-judge bench. The bench asked the Solicitor General’s office to identify and segregate the petitions so that submissions can easily be advanced and confined.
“The office of Solicitor General shall prepare a complete list of the matters pertaining to these challenges. The matters shall be put in different compartments depending upon challenge raised in individual petitions,” the apex court stated in its order. At least 220 petitions against the CAA were filed before the top court.
The plea first came up for hearing in the Supreme Court on 18 December 2019. It was last heard on June 15, 2021. CAA was passed by Parliament on December 11, 2019 and it was met with protests all across the country. The CAA came into effect on 10 January 2020.
Kerala-based Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra, Congress leader and former Union minister Jairam Ramesh, All India Majlis-e-ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) leader Asaduddin Owaisi, Congress leader Debabrata Saikia, various NGOS and law students, among others, had filed a plea before the top court challenging the Act. In 2020 Kerala government had also filed a suit in the apex court becoming the first state to challenge the CAA.
The law fast-tracks the process of granting citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians who fled religious persecution in Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan and took refuge in India on or before December 31, 2014.