SC seeks reply of Centre,RBI on plea over depositing old notes

The Supreme Court today sought response from the Centre and the RBI on a plea alleging that people were not being allowed to deposit demonetised currency notes till March 31 as promised.

"Issue notice returnable by Friday," a bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar said and asked petitioner Sharad Mishra to serve the copy of its notice to the Centre and the Reserve Bank of India during the course of the day.

The plea referred to the speech of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 8, 2016 and subsequent notification of RBI spelling out that people may deposit demonetised currency notes even after December 31, 2016 at specific RBI branches up to March 31, 2017 after complying with certain procedural requirements.

The bench, also comprising Justices D Y Chandrachud and S K Kaul considered the argument that the RBI's last ordinance, which permits only those persons who were outside India during the stipulated period to deposit the demonetised currency notes till March 31, is a breach of assurances given by the Prime Minister and the RBI.