Supreme Court: The Supreme Court is expected to rule today on petitions contesting the centre’s November 2016 decision to ban 1,000 and 500 currency notes. Because of the decision, 10 lakh crore was taken out of circulation overnight.
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Here are the top updates on this major story.
Fifty-eight petitions were filed in the Supreme Court opposing the notes ban, alleging that the government’s decision was rash and should be overturned.
The government claims that the court cannot rule on a case where no tangible relief may be awarded. It would be like “turning back the clock” or “unscrambling a scrambled egg,” according to the centre.
A five-judge Constitution bench led by Justice SA Nazeer heard the arguments before the holiday vacation and deferred the verdict on December 7. Justices BR Gavai, BV Nagarathna, AS Bopanna, and V Ramasubramanian round up the bench. It has been learned that two independent judgements were written by Justices BR Gavai and BV Nagarathna.
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Argument put forward by Centre in defence of demonetisation
The central bank stated that demonetisation was a “well-thought-out” decision that was part of a bigger strategy to tackle the threat of counterfeit money, terror financing, black money, and tax evasion.
Former Union Minister and senior counsel P Chidambaram claimed that the government has not considered alternative techniques of combating counterfeit cash or black money.
He stated that the government cannot begin a proposal on legal tender on its own. This, he stressed, could only be done with the approval of the Reserve Bank of India’s central board (RBI).
Mr Chidambaram claimed that the centre was also concealing critical decision-making documents, such as its letter to the Reserve Bank dated November 7 and the minutes of the bank’s central board meeting.
When the bank’s counsel claimed that judicial review could not be applied to economic policy decisions, the court responded that the judiciary could not fold its hands and sit just because it was an economic policy decision.
The RBI acknowledged “temporary challenges” as part of the nation-building process. According to the submission, the problems were solved via a system.
The opposition claims that the government failed to implement demonetisation, causing businesses to fail and jobs to be lost. Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge stated, “Six years after the ‘masterstroke’ the cash available in public is 72 per cent higher than that in 2016. PM (Narendra Modi) is yet to acknowledge this epic failure that led to fall of economy.”
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