Disregarding the Centre's objections, the Supreme Court decided to set up a 5-judge Constitution bench to examine the validity of the government's November 8 decision to scrap currency notes of Rs.500 and Rs.1000 denomination and asked the authorities to fulfil the commitment that people can withdraw up to Rs.24,000 each weak.
Passing the order, a bench of Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud disregarded the Centre's argument that the decision to pull out the two notes fell within the exclusive domain of the Executive and was hence beyond judicial scrutiny .
However, the order also marked a big respite for the government as the bench refused to stop or interfere with the implementation of its contentious policy. Besides, it turned down the plea for extending the December 31 deadline for accepting Rs.500 and Rs.1000 notes outside RBI, allow cooperative banks to accept deposits in the two high value notes, and raise the ceiling -Rs.24,000 for a week from banks and Rs.2,000 a day from ATMs on cash withdrawals.
Also, the court which had so far refused to stay the challenges to demonetisation in different high courts, finally heeded the plea of the government and restrained all other courts from entertaining from now on any plea opposing the decision.
The CJI-led bench framed nine questions for the Constitution bench which will go into the legality of the demonetisation decision. These include issues of whether the government's decision was a violation of the RBI Act and various Constitutional provisions, whether its implementation suffers from procedural unreasonableness and whether curbs on withdrawal of cash from bank accounts has any legal foundation. The Centre had opposed the plea for the court to examine the Constitutional validity with Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi arguing that the matter pertains to monetary and fiscal policy which fell within the domain of the Executive.
On the issue of allowing district cooperative banks to accept deposits of scrapped notes, the court said the issue was to be adjudicated only by a larger bench.
The court, however, directed the government to issue notification to allow the cooperative banks to deposit with RBI and exchange the scrapped notes they collected between November 11-14.
The court asked the Centre to take steps to reduce inconvenience caused to the people due to paucity of new notes.
Passing the order, a bench of Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud disregarded the Centre's argument that the decision to pull out the two notes fell within the exclusive domain of the Executive and was hence beyond judicial scrutiny .
However, the order also marked a big respite for the government as the bench refused to stop or interfere with the implementation of its contentious policy. Besides, it turned down the plea for extending the December 31 deadline for accepting Rs.500 and Rs.1000 notes outside RBI, allow cooperative banks to accept deposits in the two high value notes, and raise the ceiling -Rs.24,000 for a week from banks and Rs.2,000 a day from ATMs on cash withdrawals.
Also, the court which had so far refused to stay the challenges to demonetisation in different high courts, finally heeded the plea of the government and restrained all other courts from entertaining from now on any plea opposing the decision.
The CJI-led bench framed nine questions for the Constitution bench which will go into the legality of the demonetisation decision. These include issues of whether the government's decision was a violation of the RBI Act and various Constitutional provisions, whether its implementation suffers from procedural unreasonableness and whether curbs on withdrawal of cash from bank accounts has any legal foundation. The Centre had opposed the plea for the court to examine the Constitutional validity with Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi arguing that the matter pertains to monetary and fiscal policy which fell within the domain of the Executive.
On the issue of allowing district cooperative banks to accept deposits of scrapped notes, the court said the issue was to be adjudicated only by a larger bench.
The court, however, directed the government to issue notification to allow the cooperative banks to deposit with RBI and exchange the scrapped notes they collected between November 11-14.
The court asked the Centre to take steps to reduce inconvenience caused to the people due to paucity of new notes.
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