New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear on March 19 the pleas seeking a stay on the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) Rules, 2024, which opened implementation of CAA granting speedy citizenship to members of persecuted minorities in Islamic countries of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.
A bench of Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud, Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra accepted the request of senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing on of the petitioners in the case.
Mentioning the matter for urgent hearing Sibal said, “CAA was passed in 2019. At that time there was no rules, so no stay was granted. Now they have notified the rules ahead of elections. If citizenship is granted, it will be impossible to reverse. So the interim application may be heard.”
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, none of petitioners has any locus to question the grant of citizenship. The bench then said it will list all the applications seeking stay on Rules for hearing on Tuesday.
The apex court also said that the whole batch comprising 237 petitions will be listed along with the latest applications.
The Central government on March 11 notified the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024 which effectively brought into force the controversial CAA of 2019.