 "PM Narendra Modi | File photo")
The Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court on Thursday dismissed a PIL seeking declaration of funds received by the Prime Minister's Citizens Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situation (PM CARES), a charitable trust created by the Union government amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
A division bench of Justices Sunil Shukre and Anil Kilor noted that the underlying objective of public disclosure of funds is to ensure their proper utilisation.
"This objective can be seen to be more than fulfilled in the present case by registration of the fund as a charitable trust and appointment of a Chartered Accountant firm as auditor who would be bound to balance and audit accounts of the fund," the court said.
All reliefs sought in the plea are refused, the court said while dismissing the public interest litigation (PIL) filed by advocate Arvind Waghmare.
The petition had sought a direction to the government to declare funds received and expenditure of the same on the governments website periodically.
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The bench noted that the Indian Trusts Act, which is applicable to the PM CARES Fund, provides an effective mechanism for achieving the purpose of public disclosure and the petitioner (Waghmare) was free to resort to that mechanism for the redressal of his grievance.
The court further said contributions which to the fund are voluntary in nature, and there is no compulsion for anyone to donate.
"If any person has any doubt about the application of the money he or she intends to donate, then such a person would well be within his or her right to not donate money to the fund," the order said.
The petition had also sought a direction to the government and the trust to appoint or nominate at least two members from opposition parties in order to have a proper check and transparency.
To this, the court said this prayer cannot be granted as it has "no mooring in law" since the PM CARES Fund is a charitable trust that does not receive any budgetary support or government money.
"The PM CARES Fund is a registered charitable trust and hence, would be governed by its own Deed of Trust. If there is no provision made in the Trust Deed for inducting members of the opposition political parties, then the court cannot direct it do so," the bench said in its order.
"The will of the founding trustees and not the wishful thinking of outsiders in such a case, is what matters, is what prevails over the desire of strangers, the order said.
The trust was created to have financial assistance from people across the country and overseas to provide relief to those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The central government had opposed the PIL and sought its dismissal, saying a similar plea challenging the setting up of the PM CARES trust was dismissed by the Supreme Court.
Additional Solicitor General, Anil Singh, earlier argued that the petition was more of a "publicity interest litigation with underlying political agenda".
"The petitioner is a donor to the fund and not the beneficiary of the fund, and only a beneficiary can be said to be a person aggrieved if any action on part of the trust is considered to be against the law or object of the trust," Singh had said.
Waghmare in his petition said the PM CARES trust had Prime Minister Narendra Modi as its chairperson and ministers from the defence, home and finance departments as its members.
"As per guidelines of thePMCARESFund, apart from the chairperson and three other trustees, the chairperson had to appoint or nominate three more trustees. However, from the formation of the trust on March 28, 2020 till date no appointment has been made, the petition claimed.
However, the court in its order noted that this provision was not mandatory.
"We find that even though the power has been conferred upon the chairperson (of the trust) to nominate three trustees, the power is of enabling nature only, making it possible for the authority to nominate three trustees to the board and that there is no further mandate that the power must be exercised," the court said.
It said there is nothing on record to show that without the presence of three nominated eminent persons, the Board of Trustees would be incomplete or non-functional.
Waghmare had also argued that he was not challenging or disputing the creation of the trust, but being a donor to the fund, he has every right to know the exact position of the fund accounts and how the money has been disbursed.
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