Madras HC rejects PIL seeking direction to FinMin bring back black money

The Madras High Court on Monday dismissed a PIL seeking a direction to the Union Finance Ministry to take action on a representation for bringing back black money stashed away abroad based on recommendations of a task force set up by the BJP in 2011.

Petitioner R Natarajan also sought a direction from the court to the Central Public Information Office to furnish a final reply to his application under the Right to Information Act on the matter, saying he had only received interim replies from the finance ministry so far.

A division bench of Justice S Manikumar and Justice Subramonium Prasad dismissed the PIL, saying the representation and the RTI application filed on November 5 last year were the same and the latter was under investigation by the concerned department.

Moreover, some interim replies had already been given to the petitioner, it said.

The petitioner had contended that the BJP, which came to power at the Centre in 2014, had not acted on the recommendations the task force had made in its January 31, 2011 report.

The suggestions included obtaining a declaration from the office bearers of political parties, ministers and MPs about their wealth abroad, he submitted.

The task force comprised S Gurumurthy, currently a non-official director on the board of the Reserve Bank of India; National Security Advisor Ajit Doval; finance professor at Indian Institute of Management, Bengaluru, R Vaidyanathan and senior lawyer Mahesh Jethmalani.