New Delhi: The Center has told the Supreme Court that the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) is a "benign law" that seeks to provide exemptions to specific communities from specific countries with a clear cut-off date. It has urged the court to dismiss the petitions challenging its validity.
The Center insisted that the CAA does not encourage illegal migration as it is a "focused law" that grants citizenship only to members of six specified communities who came in on or before December 31, 2014. In a detailed 150-page affidavit, the Ministry of Home Affairs said: "It is submitted that the CAA is a benign law, which provides relaxation in the nature of amnesty to specific communities of specified countries with a clear cut-off date.
Chief Justice U.U. Lalit and Justice S. Ravindra Bhat and Justice Bela M. Trivedi will hear on Monday over 200 petitions challenging the CAA, mostly PILs.
The MHA said: "Parliament is competent to make laws for the whole of India or for any part of India as provided in Article 245(1) of the Constitution of India", and the CAA grants citizenship to migrants belonging to Hindu provides the facility. Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian communities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who entered India on or before December 31, 2014.
It further states that this law applies to those who have been exempted under the Passport (Entry into India) Act, 1920 and other relevant provisions and rules made by the Central Government under the Foreigners Act, 1946.
It further added that migrants already living in India and the amended law does not have any provision which provides for the grant of citizenship to such migrants who would have come after the specified date or on any future date.
The affidavit said that the CAA does not in any way encourage illegal migration to Assam and therefore the arguments claiming that it has the potential to encourage illegal migration to Assam are baseless.