In a move to expedite hearing in crucial cases such as the note ban and reservation to economically weaker sections, the Supreme Court’s five-judge constitution benches will hear 25 cases from next week. This comes as outgoing Chief Justice NV Ramana retires on August 26 and Justice UU Lalit takes over as the next Chief Justice of India on August 29.
The Supreme Court has begun hearing in the money laundering law that received thumbs up. It has decided to relook its judgment on July 27 upholding the power of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to arrest. The court had upheld the extensive powers of the ED in terms of searches, arrests and seizures, as pointed out by the petitioners. The petitioners had argued that the ED was misusing its powers against Opposition leaders. Prominent names like Karti Chidambaram and former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti are among the petitioners in the case.
The SC had ruled that the ED is “not required to share the Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) with the accused”.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court is hearing three petitions regarding remission granted to 11 convicts in Bilkis Bano gang-rape case. CJI Ramana agreed on Tuesday to hear the petition demanding immediate arrest of the 11 convicts who had raped her and murdered seven members of her family during the 2002 Gujarat riots. They were given life term in 2008 to a life term.
The apex court had directed the Gujarat government to look into the issue of remission of his sentence following which the government formed a committee, said Panchmahals Collector Sujal Mayatra, who headed the panel.
The other crucial cases to be taken up by the Supreme Court are those challenging updating of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) Assam, challenges to the establishment of Central Bureau of Investigation (pending since 2016) and the demonetisation scheme (pending since 2016).
Other cases include classification of Sikhs as a minority community in Punjab, constitutional validity of Nikah Halala and polygamy (pending since 2018); validity of a state law declaring all members of the Muslim community in Andhra Pradesh as backward class (pending since 2006).
The CJI-bench has also taken up the report by an independent committee, headed by Justice Indu Malhotra, which was set up to inquire into the security breach of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Punjab in January.
The bench said on Thursday that the Punjab SSP “failed to discharge his duty even though sufficient force was available”. “We’ll send the report to the Government of India for taking action,” the court said.
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