A constitution bench set up by the Chief Justice of India to deal with the presidential reference seeking the Supreme Court’s answers to certain issues related to the judiciary’s power to “interfere” in the executive’s policy decisions on Friday admitted it for detailed deliberation.
After Attorney General G.E. Vahanvati had placed the reference before the CJI earlier, it was referred to a five-judge Constitution bench headed by CJI S.H. Kapadia himself for preliminary view. The bench, having Justices D.K. Jain, J.S. Khehar, Dipak Misra and Ranjana Prakash Desai as the other judges, passed a brief order on its admission on Friday.
As the reference arose from the top court’s verdict in the 2G case, cancelling 122 licences, the top court thought it necessary to issue notices to main petitioners in the 2G case — former law minister and Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy and the NGO CPIL.
Notice was also issued to the Union government. All the respondents were asked to submit their reply affidavits by July 10 when the Constitution bench would take up the matter for detailed arguments on the points mentioned in the presidential reference.
However, it is a discretion given to the Supreme Court under Article 143, under which the reference is made, either to answer all the points raised in the reference, answer them partially or even return the reference unanswered after detailed deliberations.
In the reference arising out of the 2G case, the government had formulated eight broad questions — among them, whether judiciary can interfere in policy issues and will auction be the only broad factor for allocation of resources.