Passage of laws as Money Bills: Supreme Court to list case on October 12 for procedural directions

The Supreme Court is set to list on October 12 the case concerning passage of laws as money bills by the parliament [Sweta Mangal vs Union of India]..The listing would be for procedural directions like appointment of nodal counsel, and not for final hearing.The matter was mentioned today by Senior Advocate Menaka Guruswamy before a bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud."This is money Bill issue. Specific challenges to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and how this case should be heard by seven judges," Guruswamy said.The CJI then informed that all seven-judge bench matters will be listed on October 12."I have told registrar listing that on October 12 we will list all 7-judge matters for directions and then list all these 5,7 and 9-judge benches. So we will have all the initial directions," he said.Money Bills are those Bills that exclusively contain provisions for imposition of taxes and appropriation of moneys out of the Consolidated Fund. They can be introduced only in the Lok Sabha. The Rajya Sabha can only suggest amendments to money bills. The recommendations on money bills by Rajya Sabha aren’t binding on the Lok Sabha, which may choose to reject it. In November 2019, a 5-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court had ordered that validity of passage of Finance Act 2017 as money bill should be decided by a larger bench.The decision came in a batch of petitions concerning the functioning of tribunals including a challenge to the Finance Act 2017 which had revamped the schemes governing the functioning of tribunals.In that case, all suggestions made by the Rajya Sabha regarding the Bill passed in the Lok Sabha were junked, and the Act came into force on April 1, 2017.Petitions were filed before the top court challenging the same. It was the petitioners’ case that the passage of the Finance Act in the form of a Money Bill was entirely inappropriate and amounted to a fraud on the Constitution.An earlier decision regarding passage of Aadhaar Act as money had been approved by the Supreme Court.Since that decision was also by a 5-judge bench, the Supreme Court in its 2019 decision decided to refer the matter to a 7-judge bench.Interestingly, CJI Chandrachud who was then a puisne judge had dissented in the Aadhaar case and said that Aadhaar Act could not have been passed as a money bill.The plea mentioned by Guruswamy on Friday was filed through advocate Prateek K Chadha and concerned itself with amendments to the PMLA which were passed as Money Bill.The Supreme Court had upheld the same in July last year but steered clear of deciding on the validity of passage of amendments as Money Bill.