Old notes worth Rs 60 lakh recovered from dead man's chest. Will SC extend exchange window?

Siblings Arushi jain, 22, and Apurv Jain, 25, knocked the doors of the Supreme Court on Friday seeking special permission to deposit Rs 60 lakh in old notes
The queue before the Supreme Court seeking extension of the window for exchanging demonetised Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 is getting longer by the day. But a new plea filed on Friday is quite unique.

Siblings Arushi jain, 22, and Apurv Jain, 25, knocked the doors of the Supreme Court on Friday seeking special permission to deposit Rs 60 lakh in old notes which were lying in the lockers of their parents who died in a road accident nine years ago.

A bench of Chief Justice JS Khehar and Justice D Y Chandrachud sought the response of the finance ministry and RBI within four weeks.

Minors at the time of death of parents, the bank lockers were opened on the directions of the Succession Court, Saket by an order dated March 17, 2017. This was a good two-and-half months after the deadline for exchange of the demonetised notes ended.

While granting letter of administration of locker to them, the court also observed that "with regard to direction to banks to convert the old demonetiaed currency notes in new currency notes is concerned, the same cannot be done as the Supreme Court as per its order on December 16, 2016 restrained all courts below it from entertaining such petitions.

In April, the Centre had informed the Supreme Court that it took a "conscious decision" not to extend the period beyond December 30 last year for exchanging the demonetised currency notes unlike for NRIs which ended on March 31.

Initially, everyone was allowed to exchange the demonetised currency till December 30.

Explaining the further delay, Ajay Jain, lawyer for the petitioners told the apex court that "even after opening of the bank lockers, the cash was in custody of the Succession Court and they did not get possession of the currency till the grant of letter of administration. Therefore, they were not in position to deposit the same before the specified banks or RBI".

The fresh petition comes at a time when the SC, in another similar case, asked the Modi government to specify if people with genuine reasons can be allowed to deposit the demonetised currency notes.

"If one can establish that the money was his or hers, you can't deprive them from depositing the money," it had told Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar. "If there is a genuine person with valid reasons, he should have an opportunity to say that he has failed to deposit his money, and he must be given a window."

But in its affidavit, the Centre opposed providing another window of opportunity to people to deposit the demonetised notes beyond the December 30, 2016 deadline, saying it would defeat the very purpose of demonetisation that is elimination of black money.

SIMILAR CASES

A Faridabad-based couple approached SC for permission to deposit Rs 83,000 in old notes as they could not do it before the December 30 deadline as the cash stash was found in bank locker of her deceased father. In the other, Abhishek Shukla, who was arrested for being a "bookie" but was later set free along with former cricketer S Sreesanth in the 2013 IPL spot-fixing scandal, knocked the doors of the apex court requesting it to allow him to exchange Rs 5.5 lakh in demonetised notes that were seized from him during the investigation.