Policyholders move Supreme Court against LIC IPO

Chennai: The Supreme Court on Wednesday admitted a writ petition against the initial public offering (IPO) of Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) that got over early this week.

The writ petition was filed by policyholders, said Thomas Franco Rajendra Dev, Joint Convenor of NGO People First and the case is listed for Thursday. The petitioners have filed the case in the apex court to issue a writ of mandamus, to declare Section 5 of the Life Insurance Corporation Act, 1956 (as amended by the Life Insurance Corporation (Amendment) Act, 2011) to be void and inoperative to the extent the capital of the corporation is characterised as 'equity capital', and to declare Sections 130, 131, 134, and 140 of the Finance Act, 2021 and Sections 4,5,24 ad 28 of the Life Insurance Corporation Act, 1956 (as amended by the Finance Act, 2021) to be void and inoperative for being ultra vires Articles 14 read with Article 300A of the Constitution.

They also sought that Part III of the Chapter VI of the Finance Act, 2021 be declared void ab initio for the certification of the Finance Bill, 2021 as a Money Bill to be in violation of and ultra vires Article 110 of the Constitution.

Among other, it sought that the respondents - the Union of India and the LIC - not to take any steps on the basis of or in furtherance of the amended Sections 4,5, 24 and 28 of the Life Insurance Corporation Act, 1956, including the ongoing initial public offering of the LIC.