NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday suggested constituting an expert body to look into freebies offered by political parties to voters and referred the issue to a three-judge bench.
“The issues raised by parties require an extensive hearing. Certain preliminary hearings need to be determined, such as what is the scope of judicial intervention, whether the appointment of the expert body by court serve any purpose,” the Supreme Court said.

“It might be appropriate to constitute an expert body to examine the issue,” it added.
In a first, the proceeding of the bench headed by CJI N V Ramana was live streamed through a webcast portal. Incumbent Ramana is to demit office Friday.
The Supreme Court had earlier suggested the Centre could call “an all-party meeting to discuss the pros and cons of freebies and take a decision on how to curb it, if required”.

Political parties have opposed the Supreme Court’s suggestion on setting up an expert panel to examine regulatory mechanisms for freebies. Only the writ petitioners led by Ashwini Upadhyay and the Centre are agreeable to this suggestion.
The apex court had said that there is a need consisting of Niti Aayog, Finance Commission, ruling and opposition parties, Reserve Bank of India, and other stakeholders to make suggestions on how to control freebies by political parties.
The plea had claimed that political parties’ arbitrarily promises or irrational freebies for wrongful gain and to lure voters in their favour is analogous to bribery and undue influences.
It claimed that promise or distribution of irrational freebies from public funds before elections could unduly influence the voters, shake the roots of a free and fair election, and disturb the level playing field, besides vitiating the purity of the election process.