The Supreme Court today struck
down the government's policy of giving subsidies to Haj pilgrims and directed
that it be progressively "eliminated" within a period of 10 years.
"We hold that
this policy is best done away with," a bench of justices Altamas Kabir and
Ranjana Prakash Desai held.
The bench also
directed the government to reduce to two the number of its representatives in
the Prime Minister's goodwill delegation.
It said it will
look into the functioning of Haj Committee
of India and it process for selecting people for Haj pilgrimage.
The apex court was
hearing an appeal filed by the Centre challenging a Bombay High Court judgement
which had directed the Ministry of External Affairs to allow certain private
operators to handle 800 of the 11,000 pilgrims earmarked under the VIP quota
subsidised by the government.
The bench while
hearing the plea of the Centre had expanded the purview of the plea and decided
to look into the legality of the government's policy on granting subsidies to
Haj pilgrims.
No comments:
Post a Comment