The Petition filed in SC challenging RBI circular on 3-month moratorium on loan repayment Bhavni Sahai Legal Article Sun, Apr 12, 2020, at ,05:52 PM A petition was filed by Activist and Advocate Amit Sahni on 11th April 2020 in the Supreme Court, seeking direction to the Government of India and RBI on setting aside the RBI’s Circular which was released on 27th March 2020 on a three-month moratorium on loan repayment between March 1 and May 31 amid coronavirus pandemic. This petition has been filed with the view that banks and Financial Institutions must not charge interest from its customers for at least this moratorium period, as this will be in the interest of the public at large. The COVID-19 outbreak impacted the economy of the country at very large and due to which the Citizens are facing extreme hardship, whereby businesses and works are all stopped and the entire market has crashed. So, the petitioner urges the Court stating that the “state cannot enrich itself or permit any other organization or institution to be enriched particularly when it is dealing with an Emergency”, and that “it would not be fair to permit Banks/Financial Institutions to charge interest on the outstanding amount for the Moratorium Period when citizens cannot work to comply the Government’s instructions and are compulsorily incapacitated to generate funds.” The petitioner in his plea respectfully submits that “the petition does not stress that the EMIs for moratorium should be waived but the relief required is that there should be no interest upon the EMIs (not paid) during the moratorium period”. The petition maintains that though moratorium is a legal authorization to debtors to postpone payment, as announced by the RBI, however, it “is an eyewash as it provides that the interest shall be chargeable during the moratorium period and that the accumulated accrued interest shall be recovered immediately after the completion of Moratorium Period.” The petition prays for:- Setting aside of the Circular to the extent it provides that the interest shall accrue on the outstanding portion of the term loans during the moratorium period in the larger public interest. Extension of the Moratorium period.