Minority-status petition: SC fines govt for not responding

The Supreme Court on Monday pulled up the Centre for not taking a stand on a plea seeking that minority status of a community be decided at state level and not at the national level and imposed a fine of Rs 7,500. A bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and M M Sundresh pointed out that the court had on January 7 granted one last chance to the Centre to file an affidavit but the government again failed to take a stand on the issue.