Plea Filed In SC Seeking To Ascertain Feasibility Of Confiscating Black Money

A petition has been filed before the Supreme Court seeking a direction to the Centre to ascertain the feasibility of confiscating black money, Benami properties and disproportionate assets.

The petition, which is likely to come up for hearing in the coming days, has also sought life imprisonment for offences such as bribery, black money, having Benami property, tax evasion, money laundering, profiteering, grain hoarding, food adulteration, human and drug trafficking, black marketing and cheating.

The petition was filed by Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay after corruption watchdog Transparency International placed India at the 80 position in the Corruption Perception Index earlier this year.

Due to weak and ineffective anti-corruption laws, India has never been ranked above the 50th spot in the Corruption Perception Index and yet the Centre has not strengthened the laws to weed-out the menace of corruption, which brazenly offends rule of law as well as the right to life, liberty and dignity guaranteed under Articles 14 and 21, the petition stated.

"Due to the weak and ineffective anti-corruption laws, none of the welfare schemes and government departments are free from corruption," the petition further said. "The right to live happily with dignity is guaranteed under Article 21 but due to massive corruption, our ranking in Happiness Index is very low," the petition, filed through advocate Ashwini Kumar Dubey, stated.

"It (corruption) undermines democracy and rule of law, leads to violations of human rights, distorts markets, erodes quality of life and allows organized crimes like separatism, terrorism, naxalism, radicalism, gambling, smuggling, kidnapping, money laundering and extortion, and other threats to human security to flourish," it said.

The petition added that corruption hurts EWS-BPL families disproportionately by diverting the funds intended for development, undermines government's ability to provide basic services, seeds inequality and injustice, and discourages foreign aids and investment.