The Opposition refused to give credit to the Narendra Modi government for the Supreme Court's judgement on demonetisation, saying that the apex court has merely upheld the government's right to take such decisions but has not endorsed the "consequences" of such a decision.
Congress said it was "totally misleading and wrong" to say that the Supreme Court has upheld demonetisation, as it has only pronounced on whether Section 26(2) of RBI Act, 1934 was correctly applied or not before announcing demonetisation on 8 November, 2016.
"Nothing more, nothing less. One judge in her dissenting opinion has said that Parliament should not have been bypassed," Congress General Secretary (Communications) Jairam Ramesh said in a statement on Monday.
He also said the verdict has "nothing to say on whether the stated objectives of demonetisation were met or not. None of these goals -- reducing currency in circulation, moving to cashless economy, curbing counterfeit currency, ending terrorism and unearthing black money-was achieved in significant measure. The majority Supreme Court verdict deals with the limited issue of the 'process' of decision making not with its 'outcomes'."
Former Finance Minister P Chidambaram said once the Supreme Court has declared the law, we are obliged to accept it but added that the verdict may be only a slap on the wrist of the government, but a welcome slap on the wrist.
"It is necessary to point out that the majority has not upheld the wisdom of the decision; nor has the majority concluded that the stated objectives were achieved. In fact, the majority has steered clear of the question whether the objectives were achieved at all," he said.
The dissenting judgement will rank among the famous dissents recorded in the history of the Supreme Court, he added.
CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury said the verdict cannot be interpreted as upholding demonetisation. In a statement, CPI(M) Polit Bureau said the majority verdict while upholding the government’s legal right to take such a decision says nothing about the impact of such a decision.
"Demonetisation resulted in the destruction of India’s informal economy that employs crores of people. It paralyzed the small-scale industrial sector, the MSMEs, destroying crores of livelihoods. Reports noted that in one month since the decision in 2016, 82 people lost their lives," it said.
"Further, none of the objectives justifying this disastrous decision of unearthing black money and bringing this back from foreign banks; ending counterfeit currency; ending terror funding, corruption and reducing cash flows in the economy have been achieved. On the contrary, according to RBI, currency with public has gone up from Rs 17.7 lakh crore, on the eve of demonetisation to Rs 30.88 lakh crore now, i.e., an increase of 71.84 per cent," it said.
NCP national spokesperson Clyde Crasto said despite the verdict, the BJP government must be held accountable for the downfall of the economy due to demonetisation and the loss of many lives due to the disastrous, ill planned process.
CPI said in a statement that the verdict did not "take into consideration about false claims made by the government" during demonetisation. While echoing the views of other Opposition parties, CPI General Secretary D Raja demanded a detailed white paper on demonetisation.