Taking exception to the growing activism of Supreme Court in public interest causes, Attorney General KK Venugopal on Wednesday told a bench hearing environment issues that an order on a PIl must be accompanied with the economic impact it was likely to create.
Upset over the observations made by the bench running down the Government and its policies day in and out, Venugopal said, “Day in, day out, I read newspapers and your observations. But the problems facing the country are enormous and, in the past, your orders and judgments have resulted in a situation where people have lost their jobs.” The observation came while the Court was considering a proposal to set up a Committee headed by a retired apex court judge to monitor reforms in 1382 prisons.
A-G said cancellation of 122 telecom licenses in 2G case and coal block allotments impacted investments and the economy while closing of liquor vends situated 500 metre from highways led to job loss. As a solution, A-G proposed that the orders/judgments passed by Court must contain a paragraph discussing the possible repercussions arising from the decision. He pointed out to arbitrary orders on allocation of funds which forces the Government to divert funds from the budgeted amounts for 90-odd social welfare schemes.
Hearing this, the bench of Justices Madan B lokur, Deepak Gupta and S Abdul Nazeer reminded Centre of thousands of crores of unspent money lying in the CAMPA funds at the instance of the Court. Even the construction workers’ cess which collected over Rs 30000 crore was found to be spent to buy washing machines and laptops. The bench said, “Please do not carry the impression that we are criticizing the Government and preventing them from doing work. We are also citizens of this country and we know the problems facing the country. We are trying to solve some of them. look at our positive directions.”