Supreme Court seeks response from Center on petitions demanding ban on CAA
The Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Center on petitions seeking a stay on the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019 and the Citizenship Amendment Rules, 2024. The Supreme Court asked the Center to file its reply by April 8 and fixed the hearing of the case on April 9. Let us inform you that the petitioners had requested the Supreme Court to put a stay on the Citizen Amendment Rules, 2024, although the court did not pass any such order.
On the other hand, the Central Government on Tuesday sought time from the Supreme Court to file its reply on the applications requesting to stay the implementation of the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Center in the case, told the bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Manoj Mishra that he needed some time to respond to the 20 applications.
In these applications, a request has been made to put a stay on the related rules until the apex court disposes of the petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019. Mehta told the bench that ‘this (CAA) does not take away the citizenship of any person.’
Let us tell you that after the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 by the Central Government, different petitioners from across the country had filed more than 200 petitions against it. These petitioners mainly include AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi, Kerala government and Indian Union Muslim League.
Owaisi filed the petition seeking an immediate stay on it, saying that during the pendency of the proceedings, the demand for granting citizenship status under Section 6B of the Citizenship Act, 1955 (as it is amended by the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019) Any application made by the Government should not be considered or taken action by the Government.
Let us tell you, the Union Home Ministry had notified the rules for the implementation of CAA on March 11. The CAA rules passed by Parliament in 2019 aim to provide Indian citizenship to persecuted non-Muslim immigrants, including Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians, who came to India from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan before December 31, 2014.
