"With Passage Of Time...": Judge's Dissenting Verdict On Assam Accord Ruling
NDTV
Justice JB Pardiwala said Section 6A of the Citizenship Act failed the test of temporal unreasonableness.
The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the validity of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, which recognised the Assam Accord, but one of the judges of the bench gave a dissenting judgment. The five-judge Constitution Bench comprising Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud, Justices Surya Kant, MM Sundresh, Manoj Misra and JB Pardiwala were on the bench which allowed refugees from Bangladesh who entered India between 1966 and 1971 to seek Indian citizenship.
In his dissenting judgment, Justice Pardiwala held that the provision has become invalid with the passage of time. Laying out his reasoning, the judge said that Section 6A failed the test of temporal unreasonableness and that even if it was valid when it was included in the Citizenship Act in 1985, it was no longer so with the "efflux of time".
READ | Big Supreme Court Ruling On Citizenship Of Immigrants In Assam Before 1971