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Centre for Public Interest Litigation v. Union of India

Writ Petition (Civil) · 2020 INSC 494Decided 18 Aug 2020
Writ Petition (Civil) No. 546 of 2020
Justice Ashok Bhushan · Justice R. Subhash Reddy · Justice M.R. Shah

Background

During the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, a public interest litigation was filed seeking directions to the Union Government to formally notify and implement a National Plan under the Disaster Management Act, 2005 and to lay down minimum standards of relief for those affected by COVID-19 and the resulting lockdown. The petition's most prominent demand was that the Government be directed to use the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF), rather than the newly created "PM CARES Fund", for pandemic relief, and that all funds already collected in PM CARES be transferred into the NDRF, arguing the law required public/institutional disaster donations to go into the statutory NDRF under Section 46 of the Act.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held there is no statutory bar on the Union Government using the NDRF to fight COVID-19, and no prohibition on individuals or institutions contributing to the NDRF, but equally, there is nothing unlawful about the Government separately creating the PM CARES Fund as a public charitable trust to receive voluntary contributions, since contribution to PM CARES is voluntary and the Disaster Management Act does not make the NDRF the exclusive permissible fund for disaster relief. The Court found NDRF and PM CARES Fund are "two entirely different funds with different objects and purposes," and refused to order the transfer of PM CARES Fund money into the NDRF, since there was no legal basis compelling such a transfer. The main prayers were refused and the writ petition was dismissed, subject to the Court's clarification of the law on the two funds' permissible, non-exclusive use.

Lesson Learnt

The existence of a statutory disaster relief fund (like the NDRF) does not, by itself, bar the government from also creating and operating a separate voluntary charitable trust for the same emergency: courts will only compel government action (like transferring funds) where a specific statutory provision actually requires it, not merely because a petitioner considers one fund preferable to another.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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