The 18th November 2016 demonetisation of high denomination notes in India was indeed cataclysmic, withdrawing as it did 86 percent of the cash from circulation. One has heard of loss of purchasing power of a currency but this was a case of people losing their currency itself. It threw life pell-mell in a country where cash rules the roost especially in hinterlands and in unorganised sectors including farms and small industries sector.
The stealthy announcement had noble intents though like leaving terrorists and financial crooks holding the can and eliminate counterfeit notes. But it was botched up at the altar of implementation and re-monetisation. Almost 99 percent of the notes found their way into the mainstream thanks to latitude given for use of the demonetised notes in hospitals, petrol bunks and crooks co-opting Jan Dhan bank account holders to deposit their ill-gotten cash. The scrutiny of notes deposited in bank accounts is still work-in-progress! Yet another move, a year after demonetization, freezing of some two lakh bank accounts of suspected shell companies is still a work-in-progress too!
That said, what good is going to come from the review of the earthshaking exercise done six years ago as the Supreme Court is currently engaged in? To be sure, it was a peremptory executive order that shook the nation like no other economic decision of the government had hitherto been done. Yet was there a malafide that underpinned the decision? It must be remembered the Courts including the Apex Court were petitioned by several persons hot on the heels of the announcement to stop the government on its tracks but the Supreme Court then took a principled decision not to rock the executive boat. Pray, why is it doing so now – post facto six years after the event?
To be sure, the Apex Court did take up 2G and coal allocation gratis cases for hearing years after their allotments. But they were not fait accompli like the denomination case. 2G licences allotted on FCFS basis were cancelled on the ground they were potentially corrupting of the executive (the actual charges of kickbacks are yet to be proved). Ditto for coal allotments gratis rather than through transparent auctions. As against these two, demonetisation cannot be annulled as it has played out fully for good or bad of the nation on which the jury is divided right down the middle.
There is no point in exhuming the past especially if doing so isn’t going to result in retrieving losses if any. Demonetisation is a case in point. An email once sent cannot be called back before it reaches the recipient(s) just as an arrow sent out of the bow cannot be. Will the Supreme Court entertain a petition almost five decades after the infamous emergency was declared by the then prime minister Indira Gandhi? Will it review the decision of the then prime minister Pandit Nehru to smoke peace pipe with the Chinese Premier Chou En Lai that lulled the nation into complacency only to be back stabbed by China? To be sure, some of the executive decisions could always be based on error of judgement and such an error might show up in hindsight. In demonetisation, admittedly there was lack of preparedness in both re-monetisation and in giving latitude for getting round the exercise but can the Supreme Court pull up the government of the day or previous governments when no mala fide is involved? This is a moot question. Already the ApexCourt is criticised for its judicial activism. This will go a step further in aggravating the tensions between the two.
The Apex Court while inventing public interest litigation (PIL) in people’s interest has in recent times pulled up busybodies for abuse of PIL with imposition of heavy fines for such abuse and going to the extent of branding such abuse as private interest litigation (PIL). One wonders if the spate of petitions seeking review of demonetisation belongs to the PIL of good category or bad category. In Hindi there is a saying gade murde ukhaadna which loosely translated means digging up the past to settle scores.
—The author S Murlidharan
is a CA by qualification, and writes on economic issues, fiscal and commercial laws. The views expressed in the article are personal.
Read his previous articles here
(Edited by : CH Unnikrishnan)
First Published: Dec 23, 2022 9:35 AM IST
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