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SC refuses to stay citizenship law without hearing the govt.
Why in news?
- SC recently said that the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019, is “uppermost in everybody’s minds”, but refused to stay the law without hearing the government first.
More in news
- Not Even Postponed: A 3-judge Bench led by CJI did not heed pleas to even postpone the process of collecting population data to identify illegal migrants or “doubtful citizens” on the basis of their religion.
- Refer to Constitution Bench:
(1) 144 petitions: A total of 144 petitions were listed before the Bench challenging CAA.
(2) The CJI indicated that CAA challenge may eventually be referred to a Constitution Bench for a decision on merits.
- Response to Fresh Petitions:
(1) SC gave the government four weeks to file its response to at least 80 more fresh petitions filed for and against the CAA.
(2) The government urged the court to “freeze” the number of petitions filed in the case.
- Interim Orders in Feb: The court said it would list the case in February to pass interim orders. It asked the senior lawyers involved in the case to categorise the petitions and work out a schedule for hearing them.
- Argument by Lawyers:
(1) National Population Register exercise is commencing in April.
(2) Data collected through it would be used for preparing a nationwide National Register of Citizens (NRC).
- Importance to N-E pleas
(1) The CJI indicated that the court would give due importance to petitions concerning the impact of CAA in border States such as Assam and Tripura.
(2) These cases may be segregated and heard, however, all the petitions on CAA would be subject to a common final decision.
Sources
The Hindu