New Delhi – India’s Supreme Court Wednesday said it would hear a clutch of petitions challenging a new citizenship law in January as protests against it spreads.
The petitions contend that the new law which makes it easier for non-Muslim migrants from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh to become an Indian national goes against India’s secular constitution by supporting religion-based discrimination.
There have been demonstrations across the country against the Citizenship Amendment Act which came into force on December 12.
A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court refused to stay operation of law and said it would take up the petitions in January, according to legal reporting website LiveLaw.
The court asked the federal government to file a response to the petitions by the second week of January, LiveLaw reported.
