Kerala Governor Arif Mohammad Khan today hit out at the Pinarayi Vijayan government after it challenged the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA in the Supreme Court, saying “common courtesy demanded that prior permission” should have been taken from him. The Kerala government challenged the validity of the law in the top court on Tuesday, becoming the first state to do so.
Governor Arif Mohammad Khan this morning suggested that the state government’s move was a “breach of protocol”. “I’m not saying that what they did is wrong. They may have every right to approach the Supreme Court,” he said.
“But the common courtesy demanded that prior permission (should have been) taken from me… at least I should have been kept in the loop,” he told reporters.
Mr Khan also suggested that he will “check if the state government can do this without permission from the governor”. “The constitutional head of the state is getting to know about this through newspapers that the state government is challenging a law passed by the parliament,” he further said.
Over 60 writ petitions have been filed in Supreme Court so far against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. Various political parties, NGOs and also MPs have challenged the law. The Supreme Court will hear the petitions on January 22.
Earlier this month, Kerala became the first state in the country to pass a resolution against the CAA in the assembly. The governor, however, had said that the resolution “has no legal or constitutional validity”. “This resolution has no legal or constitutional validity because citizenship is exclusively a central subject, this actually means nothing,” he had said.
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