The Supreme Court on Thursday (February 19, 2026) scheduled the final hearing from May 5 in over 250 petitions challenging the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 and its Rules, which accelerate the grant of Indian citizenship to non-Muslim migrants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.
A three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant said the court would hear the case back to back from May 5 till May 7 and take it up again on May 12 to hear any rejoinder arguments before reserving judgment.
The court said it would first hear the “general” CAA petitions and then examine the complex issues concerning the citizenship law in Assam and Tripura.
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A group of petitions have contended that the CAA and its Rules were a threat to Assam’s demography. The petitions have contended that 27 districts in Assam were brought under the purview of the CAA “for no reason at all”. They have argued that the CAA did not apply to tribal areas of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram or Tripura included in the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution and the areas covered under ‘The Inner Line’ notified under the Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873. They said the cut-off date of December 31, 2014 for grant of citizenship under Section 6B(1) of the CAA contradicted Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, 1955, which mandated deportation for foreigners who had crossed over after March 25, 1971.
The case had last come up in March 2024 before a Bench led by then Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, for the petitioners, had then argued that the Act came into existence in 2019 and the government had waited for nearly five years to notify the Rules.
“Once the process of grant of citizenship starts under this Act, it cannot be reversed,” Mr. Sibal had submitted in an oral mentioning.
Mr. Sibal represents the Indian Union Muslim League, a political party also represented by advocate Haris Beeran. The League is the primary petitioner in the lead case, which has 237 separate petitions challenging the legality of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 on the ground that it discriminates in granting citizenship on the basis of religion. The Democratic Youth Federation of India, represented by advocate Subhash Chandran K.R., has also filed an application seeking an interim stay on the implementation of the law.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta appears for the Union government. The Centre had challenged the locus standi of the petitioners to question whether the Centre could grant citizenship.
The Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) had argued that the Rules, which govern the actual implementation of the CAA at the ground level, facilitate a highly truncated and fast-tracked process for grant of citizenship to “illegal migrants” belonging to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, and Christian communities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan who entered India on or before December 31, 2014.
The Rules had done away with the independent and tiered scrutiny of applications by District Collectors on the ground and the recommendations of State governments on the wisdom of granting citizenship to applicants. The Citizenship Rules of 2009 had required the Centre to consult State governments in the grant of citizenship process.
“The scrutiny of the application for registration or naturalisation was held at three levels – the Collector, the State government and the Central government. It is ultimately the Central government that made the decision to grant citizenship,” IUML submitted.
The CAA Rules, 2024 grant the power of scrutiny to a ‘District Level Committee’ to verify documents and administer the oath of allegiance. An ‘Empowered Committee’ has been authorised to scrutinise citizenship applications, but this is not mandatory. Even the composition of the Empowered Committee is defined in the Rules, the IUML had noted.
“There is no scope for the State government to give recommendations or for the Central government to conduct an inquiry about the suitability of the applicant,” it had submitted.
The petitioners cut across political party lines and come from various walks of life across the country. They include parliamentarians such as Jairam Ramesh, Mahua Moitra and Asaduddin Owaisi, the Asom Gana Parishad, an association of lawyers from Assam, Kamal Haasan’s Makkal Needhi Maiam and Kerala’s IUML.
The petitions have argued that the law welcomes “illegal migrants” into India selectively on the basis of their religion and excludes Muslims. They contend that it has an “unholy nexus” with the National Register of Citizens exercise and is against the principles of secularism, right to equality and dignity of life enshrined in the basic structure of the Constitution.
“While the NRC exercise would result in identification of persons as “illegal migrants”, the Amendment Act seeks to simultaneously offer illegal migrants who are Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian citizenship on the presumed ground of persecution,” Mr. Owaisi contended.
The new citizenship law fast tracks citizenship by naturalisation for minority Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian migrants from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh who entered India illegally claiming religious persecution in their native countries.
However, the law does not impose any requirement on illegal migrants from the six religions to prove their claim of religious persecution or even a reasonable fear of it.
The petitions have argued that the legislation effectuates discrimination on the basis of the intrinsic and core identity of an individual, that is, religious identity as a Muslim.
The Act ensures that only an illegal immigrant who is Muslim would be singled out and prosecuted under the Passports (Entry into India) Act, 1920 or the Foreigners Order, 1949 and deprived of personal liberty. On the other hand, illegal migrants from the six religions would be entitled to Indian citizenship and the benefits that come with it. While Muslim migrants would have to show proof of residency in India for at least 11 years, the law allows illegal migrants from the six communities to be naturalised in five years.
Published – February 19, 2026 04:58 pm IST
