The Center has sought an open court hearing on a petition seeking review of the Supreme Court's verdict on benami transactions. Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, urged a bench of CJI DY Chandrachud and Justice PS Narasimha to hear the review petition in open court keeping in view the merits of the matter. Due to this judgement, many orders are being passed while some provisions of Benami Act are not even challenged, he said. In response to the petition of the Center, the Supreme Court has said that we will consider it. 

Tell me, in August last year, the apex court had canceled some provisions of the benami law. Under one of these provisions, indulging in a benami transaction was punishable with a maximum jail term of three years, or with fine, or with both. The apex court termed this provision as unconstitutional. The Court had also said that Section 3(2) and Section 5 of the Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Act, 1988 were vague and arbitrary.

Supreme Court to hear separately petitions related to electoral bonds, FCRA amendment, bringing parties under RTI Will hear the petitions separately. A bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice PS Narasimha on Tuesday said that these petitions raise three different issues and hence need to be heard separately.

A set of petitions have challenged the law allowing donations to political parties through the Electoral Bond Scheme. Whereas in the second set, there has been a demand to bring the parties under the purview of the Right to Information Act. At the same time, the third set of PILs challenges the amendments made to the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act, 2010 by the Central Government through the Finance Acts of 2016 and 2018. The amended FCRA law reportedly allows political parties to receive foreign donations.

The Supreme Court noted that the present batch of petitions is divided in terms of the above three challenges. Three sets of petitions need to be heard separately. Along with this, the bench has also asked the Central Government to file a reply on some petitions. The court said that the petitions challenging the electoral bond scheme would be heard in the third week of March, while the petitions seeking to bring political parties under the RTI would be heard in the first week of April. The CJI said the petitions challenging the FCRA amendment would be heard in mid-April.

The National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) told the Supreme Court on Tuesday that as per the latest data, around 5,000 undertrial prisoners were in jails despite being granted bail and 1,417 of them have been released. In a report filed in the apex court, NALSA has said that it is in the process of preparing a 'master data' of all such undertrial prisoners (UTPs) who are unable to get sureties or furnish bail bonds due to poverty Can't get released from.

The Supreme Court in its order on November 29 last year took the step to address the issue of undertrial prisoners, who are in custody due to their inability to meet bail conditions. The top court had asked states to issue directions to prison authorities to provide information of such undertrial prisoners to NALSA. NALSA will give necessary suggestions on how to deal with the issue and provide legal assistance where necessary.