New Delhi: Seeking response of the Centre on a batch of fresh pleas challenging the constitutional validity of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the Supreme Court on Thursday issued notice to the Centre and others.
The petitions were filed by 15 petitioners including Kerala Nadvathul Mujahideen, Anjuman Trust and Dakshin Kerala Jameeyathul Ulema. While issuing notice to the centre, a bench, comprising Chief Justice S A Bobde and justices B R Gavai and Surya Kant tagged them along with over 150 petitions challenging the CAA, which may come up for hearing in March, PTI reported.
The CAA, which was passed by the Modi government on January 10, grants Indian citizenship to non-Muslim minorities — Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian — who migrated to India from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh till December 31, 2014.
While refusing to stay its operation, the apex court, on December 18 last year, decided to examine the constitutional validity of the CAA.
While hearing a batch of petitions, the top court had on January 22 gave the government four weeks to respond to the pleas challenging the CAA. The court may fix them for day-to-day hearing after four weeks.
Several petitions including the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), Congress leader Jairam Ramesh, RJD leader Manoj Jha, Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra and AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi have filed pleas challenging the constitutional validity of the CAA.
The other petitioners include the Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, the All Assam Students Union (AASU), the Peace Party, the CPI, NGOs Rihai Manch and Citizens Against Hate, advocate M L Sharma, and law students.