Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on January 19 dubbed the proposal of some States to not implement the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) as ‘unconstitutional’ and said it was the responsibility of all States to ensure that the law passed in the Parliament is executed.
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“A State Assembly has passed a resolution against CAA. It is like making a political statement. We can understand that. But saying they will not implement it, is against the law. It is unconstitutional to say that”, she said.
Ms. Sitharaman was responding to a query from the audience, at an event on the CAA, organised by Chennai Citizens’ Forum, on some States like Kerala having opposed the implementation of the CAA.
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“Everybody in this country has the responsibility to implement the law which has been passed in the Parliament,”, the Minister, who is here as part of BJP’s nationwide ‘Jan Jagran Abhiyan’ campaign in support of the Act, said.
The Kerala government last week moved the Supreme Court against the CAA, seeking for the Act to be declared “violative of the principles of equality, freedom and secularism enshrined in the Constitution”.
Several Sate governments,including Kerala, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and Maharashtra have voiced their disagreement with the CAA, the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and National Population Register (NPR).
Congress leader Kapil Sibal had said there was no way a State could deny implementation of the CAA when it was already passed by the Parliament.
