Introduction 

In her Public Interest Litigation (PIL), BJP lawmaker Ashwini Upadhyay asked the federal and state governments to impose restrictions on cash transactions on e-commerce sites like Amazon and Flipkart. The petition also asks for guidelines prohibiting cash transactions worth more than 10,000 rupees from being used to pay for air and train tickets, as well as bills for electricity, gas, LPG or CNG. Additionally, a prayer has been offered to guide the governments in taking action to lessen corruption. In order to prevent corruption, the creation of black money, money laundering, benami transactions, and disproportionate assets, the request in this PIL is a useful strategy.

Political leaders who have encouraged corruption and have access to significant amounts of black money may focus on the suffering of the average man, according to the PIL, but honest citizens won’t lose their hard-earned earnings or have anything seized. The argument in support of the plea was that despite India’s extremely low rankings in both the world happiness index and the global peace index, the federal government and individual states have not done action to combat corruption.

It continued by saying that the Central Government’s actions, such as recalling notes with denominations greater than 100, limiting cash transactions worth more than 10,000, connecting the movable property to Aadhaar, and passing legislation to seize benami assets and black money, would increase India’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 2%.

Court Observation

Instead of giving notice on the petition, a division bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela requested the government attorney to get guidance on it. During the hearing, the Bench questioned BJP leader and petitioner Ashwini Upadhyay about whether the Court could give mandamus on such a matter. The majority of the corruption in the nation, according to Upadhyay, is brought on by these cash transactions.