Citizenship Amendment Act: Supreme Court to Hear the Plea in December

NEW DELHI: Even after the violent protests in several parts of the country which led to the death of many individuals, the central government of India passed the Citizenship Amendment Act in 2019.

With the restrictions issued for Covid-19, all protests had to be ceased. But a huge number of petitions were filed by several people as well as organizations against this legislation. Accepting the 232 such petitions for hearing, the bench led by Chief Justice of India U U Lalit, gave a deadline of December 6, to all the concerned parties to file completed paperwork. The Government of India, the Government of Assam and the Government of Tripura along with the petitioners will be taking part in this legal matter.

Representing the Central Government Tushar Mehta, the Solicitor General of India filed a reply mentioning the act to be a "benign piece of legislation". The state governments of Assam and Tripura are yet to give any replies on this matter.

Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi who is one of the petitioners in the matter mentioned that one of the petitions should be called the main case and proceedings be made accordingly. This way the hearings can start soon and proceed quickly. And since all of the petitions led to the same objectives, the important idea is to get the hearings started.

The Bench chose the petition of the Indian Union Muslim League as the main case and its lawyer, advocate Pallavi Pratap as the petitioners' nodal counsel. Kanu Agarwal was appointed the nodal counsel for the government side. Assam and Tripura have three weeks to file their replies, and the nodal counsel will have two weeks to compile the case thereafter.

The act allows the speeding up of the citizenship-by-naturalization allowed by Indian law. The problem is "illegal migrants" from six religious communities, other than Muslims, who have fled religious persecution from the neighbouring countries Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan.

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