Without issuing notice to the Centre, a bench of justices R M Lodha and A R Dave asked the petitioner to serve the copy of the petition to Attorney General (AG) G E Vahanvati or Solicitor General (SG) Rohinton Nariman saying it needs some necessary clarification on the issue.
The bench, which posted the matter for hearing on October 12, directed the petitioner to delete the name of the Prime Minister as a party in the petition.
While seeking the assistance of top law officers, the bench said, "We just want to have little clarity on the issue" as some link is missing.
During an hour-long hearing, the bench said opening the retail sector to FDI is a policy matter and "policy is exclusively in the domain of the government of the day. Some may say it is good and some may say it is bad but nothing is ultra vires."
"These are matters dealt with exclusively by ministries," the bench further observed.
The court was hearing a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) petition filed by advocate M L Sharma who has alleged that the notification was issued without the authority of law as approval of neither the President nor the Parliament was secured.
The bench, however, observed that "this assumption that the policy has to be in the name of the President is flawed and unfounded." (More)