Amidst anti-CAA protests, Kerala has become the first state to officially challenge the CAA in the Supreme Court.
According to Hindustan Times, the case has been filed as an original suit under Article 131 of the Constitution that allows the Supreme Court to hear disputes between government of India and the states.
The petition states that the act violates the right to equality under Article 14 of the Indian Consitution, the right to life under Article 21 and the freedom to practice religion under Article 25.
It also argues that the CAA is discriminatory in nature as it only covers a certain class of minorities from a few selected countries that share India’s border, where there have been trans-border migration.
The Pinarayi Vijayan government’s petition says:
While the Hindus from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh are covered by the Impugned Amendment Act, the defendant did not consider the issues of the Hindus, primarily of Tamil descend, in Sri Lanka and Hindu Madhesis in Terai of Nepal, whose ancestors migrated to Sri Lanka and Nepal respectively in the eighteenth Century from the then British India.
The petition says that the CAA has ignored other minorities such as the Ahmaddiyas, Shias and Hazaras.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who has been at the forefront of opposing the law, had also previously written to 11 chief ministers to join him in opposing the CAA.
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