The Delhi High Court has set aside a trial court order allowing a convict in a corruption case to deposit the fine in old demonetised notes holding that once the use of old notes is permitted by the Centre for limited purposes, “the court could not have enlarged the category of goods, services and purposes for which they could be offered as legal tender”.
“Once the Rs.1000 and Rs.500 notes demonetised, they ceased to be legal tender, except for limited purposes permitted by the Centre and the RBI. The court could not have enlarged the category of goods, services and purposes for which the demonetized currency notes could be offered as legal tender. The same was clearly beyond the judicial competence of the learned Special CBI Judge,” said Justice Vipin Sanghi.
‘Pay fine in legal manner’
The HC has directed the convict to seek transfer of fine amount deposited in old invalid notes and pay the fine in a legal manner.
The court also directed the registry to communicate the order to all District Judges and all judicial officers so that similar relaxation is not granted to any person to permit deposit in the treasury of any amount in banned notes.
In the instant case, a man was convicted on November 5 for demanding and accepting bribe by impersonating his father, a CBI inspector.
The Special CBI judge sentenced him to three-year imprisonment and a fine of Rs.75,000.
The convict came to the high court seeking suspension of his sentence but was denied the relief.
‘Beyond jurisdiction’
During the hearing of his application, the high court noted that the Special CBI judge had, in his order on sentence dated November 16 i.e post demonetisation, “clearly strayed into an area which was well beyond his jurisdiction” by allowing the convict to pay fine in demonetised notes.
Reasoning
The Special CBI Judge had said in his order that the government has permitted limited use of old currency notes for certain urgent and essential purposes and the guidelines have been revised for convenience of general public and “Since it has been submitted on behalf of the convict that it will not be possible to arrange the total fine amount of Rs.75,000 in the present scenario, the convict is being permitted to deposit the fine amount of Rs.75,000 in old currency”.
“The aforesaid reasoning cannot be appreciated,” Justice Sanghi held.
