NEW DELHI: More than six years after its enactment sparked riots in Delhi, the Supreme Court on Thursday scheduled a four-day final hearing from May 5 on 243 petitions challenging the validity of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, which provides a path to citizenship for Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Parsis and Christians who may have reached India after fleeing religious persecution in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.A bench of Justices CJI Surya Kant, Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi said the petitioners, including Muslim organizations (among which the Indian Muslim League was named as the main petitioner) and workers of the Congress, TMC and AIMIM, will conclude their arguments within one and a half days and the Center will respond within a similar period. May 12 has been reserved for the petitioners to file their replies.On December 18, 2019, a three-judge bench, including Justice Kant, issued notice on a petition filed against the CAA on the grounds of discrimination against Muslims who came to India from neighboring countries but were not entitled to CAA citizenship.Protesters, mostly Muslim women backed by political parties, blocked a main thoroughfare in Shaheen Bagh from December 15, 2019, to March 24, 2020. Lockdowns were also organized in other parts of the city. The resulting tensions sparked riots in northeast Delhi on February 23, 2020, which lasted for several days and left 53 people dead.The SC last heard the petition on March 19, 2024, the year the Center framed the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules. The Center responded to the petition in October 2022, saying the CAA is a benign legislation that provides Indian citizenship to members of the community who have been persecuted for the past 70 years in three neighboring Islamic countries: Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.In response to accusations that CAA discriminates against Muslims, the center said, “CAA does not seek to acknowledge or seek to provide answers to all or any type of persecution that may occur or may have occurred before anywhere in the world.”A bench on Thursday agreed with Solicitor General Tushar Mehta that challenges to the CAA in Assam and Tripura can be decoupled from those challenging the law from a pan-India perspective. Assam and Tripura have separate agreements stipulating the deadline for entry of Bangladeshi migrants.
