Around 500 postcards have been sent to the Supreme Court by citizenships concerned about the divisive Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 (CAA), the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the National Population Register (NPR).

The postcard campaign began on Friday in Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh, where a number of women have been protesting the brutal police crackdown at Jamia Millia Islamia.

About 500 letters, addressed to Chief Justice of India S.A. Bobde in Hindi, Urdu and English, were written by local residents, as well as others who had descended to the protest site from outside.

In one of the postcards, Rohini resident Prabhjit Singh wrote: “Hon. CJI, Our country is constitutionally secular and the ruling BJP has been adopting communal approach. The present government is dividing the country on communal lines.”

Volunteers writing the postcards (A Telegraph photo)

“Humara samvidhan sabhi dharmon ke liye hai aur yeh kanoon humein baatna chahta hai (Our Constitution is for every religion and this law wants to divide us all),” one resident wrote in Hindi.

In another letter, written in Urdu, Saif Siddiqui wrote: “Aap se darkhwast hai ki aap is insaaniyat ke khilaaf firqa-parast party ki taraf se banaya hua kanoon khatm karne ki zehmat ganwara famaye (It is our humble request that you [the CJI] repeal the law enacted at the behest of this insensitive and communal government).”

There have been multiple occasions when postcards, letters and emails have been considered by Indian courts as petitions. Only days ago, Allahabad High Court took cognisance of the “situation in Uttar Pradesh” after an email by a Bombay High Court lawyer.

The “situation in Uttar Pradesh” is also a result of the protests by ordinary citizens against the amended citizenship law and the NRC. The court said it was “alleged that the situation in the State of Uttar Pradesh is antithetical to core constitutional values and warrants interference of this Court” while converting the email into a public interest litigation (PIL).

The people behind the postcard campaign are hoping for something similar. This group of campaigners include lawyers, academicians and students who call themselves Peaceful People Action Solidarity Group.

“The Indian legal jurisprudence has an illustrious history of citizens writing letters and telegrams to the Supreme Court seeking implementation of fundamental rights of people. This is a similar attempt by the citizens of this country to make their voices heard before the Supreme Court, the final guardian of the Indian Constitution,” said advocate Mangla Verma, who is associated with the group.

Nailah Istifa, a Jamia student and one of the volunteers, is taking these postcards to different localities in Delhi to get the larger public involved. The group has taken their campaign online as well, appealing to people from across the country to send postcards to the Chief Justice of India.

“The Supreme Court should know what people think about this act and how they are opposed to the proposed NRC and NPR. It is these ordinary people who want to protect their Constitution and look up to the courts to do so,' said Abdul Qadir, a Shaheen Bagh local behind this campaign.

Qadir, who has managed political campaigns for Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy with Prashant Kishor’s I-PAC and independently for Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh and Bihar leader Upendra Kushwaha in the past, hopes to send at least 10,000 postcards to the Chief Justice before the January 22 hearing of the plea challenging the constitutional validity of the law.