For the seventh time in a straight, the central government has sought an extension of time to frame rules under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) passed in December 2019. The Rajya Sabha committee has already granted the Centre’s plea for an additional six months to develop regulations under the. According to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), additional time was required to formulate the Act’s rules before they could be put into effect. The Lok Sabha committee’s verdict is still pending.
It is notable that without framing rules under the new act, the act can’t be implemented.
The parliamentary committee on subordinate legislation had earlier extended the deadline in the Rajya Sabha until December 31 2022 and in the Lok Sabha until January 9, 2023. According to sources, the MHA requested a six-month extension, which the Rajya Sabha committee granted until June 30.
Rajya Sabha committee accepted Centre’s request for 6 more months to frame rules under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) for seventh time in a row.
— IANS (@ians_india) January 8, 2023
Ministry of Home Affairs said more time was needed to frame rules of the Act, without which it could not be implemented, Sources. pic.twitter.com/0n8SxMaxEU
According to the Manual on Parliamentary Work, a Ministry shall “request an extension of time from the Committee on Subordinate Legislation expressing grounds for such extension” if it is unable to prepare the rules regulating a law within the required period of six months following the signing. This is the seventh consecutive time that the union government has sought a six-months time to frame the rules of CAA.
Amit Shah, the Union Home Minister, stated while addressing a program in November 2022 that the Covid19 outbreak had caused a delay in the act’s implementation. He had said that the CAA would unquestionably be implemented and anyone who believed otherwise would be proven to be wrong.
The Citizenship Amendment Act was approved by the president the day after it was enacted by Parliament on December 11, 2019, and the MHA then notified the public. Approximately 83 people lost their lives and countless more were hurt during the nationwide demonstration and subsequent riots against this law. Significantly, the religiously persecuted minority migrants from neighboring Muslim-majority countries who entered India before or on December 31, 2014, will receive Indian citizenship through the CAA. It was approved for migrants from non-Muslim communities, such as Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs, Christians, and Parsis from Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
