4th Constitution Bench Of Supreme Court Formed, Pleas Challenging Demonetisation Listed Tomorrow

One more Constitution Bench has been constituted in the Supreme Court to hear matters pending before 5-judge benches.

The new bench comprises Justices S Abdul Nazeer, BR Gavai, AS Bopanna, V Ramasubramanian and BV Nagarathna.  The bench will sit tomorrow to consider five cases. 

The petitions filed in 2016 challenging the decision of the Central Government to demonetise the currency notes of Rs.500 and Rs 1000 are listed as the first item before the bench(Vivek Narayan Sharma vs Union of India WP(c) 906/2016 and 57 connected cases).

The second matter relates to the question whether restrictions can be imposed on the fundamental right to freedom of speech exercised by Ministers (Kaushal Kishor vs. The State of Uttar Pradesh Govt. of U.P. Home Secretary with 1 connected matter Case No.: W.P.(CRL.) No.113/2016)

The third matter relates to the issue Whether Article 105/194 (2) of the Constitution of India confers any immunity on the Members of Parliament/Legislative Assembly from being prosecuted for an offence involving offer or acceptance of bribe to caste vote in a legislature?(Sita Soren Vs. Union Of India,Case No.: CRL.A.NO.451/2019).

The fourth matter relates to the powers under Section 319 of the CrPC(Sukhpal Singh Khaira Vs. The State Of Punjab with 2 connected matters Case No.: CRL.A.NO.885/2019).

The fifth case is relating to questions under the Prevention of Corruption Act (Neeraj Dutta vs State, CrlA 16669/2009).

Fourth Constitution Bench 

The new bench will be the fourth live Constitution Bench in the Supreme Court. The other benches are led by CJI UU Lalit, Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice SK Kaul respectively. There was another Constituton Bench led by Justice Indira Banerjee, which has been dissolved following her retirement last week.

So, there has been altogether 5 Constitution Benches so far during the term of CJI UU Lalit.

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