Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Jan 20: In order to end confusion at various levels and give further momentum to the disposal of large number of pending corruption cases, the State Government has defined the territorial jurisdiction of Special Judges (Anti-Corruption) in consultation with the High Court as well as State Vigilance Commission. With this decision, the initiative of conferring powers on the courts of seven Additional District and Sessions Judges to handle corruption cases would start yielding expected results.
The necessity to confer powers on the courts of seven Additional District and Sessions Judges to deal with corruption cases was felt by State High Court while hearing a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) titled Mohammad Amin Beigh Versus State and Others in Srinagar Wing. Accordingly, on July 9, 2012, High Court issued directions to the State through Chief Secretary to take immediate steps for conferring powers on the courts of seven Additional District and Sessions Judges under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
After sleeping over this direction of far reaching consequences for more than one year, the Government in the month of August 2013, issued notification empowering Additional District and Sessions Judge Udhampur, Additional District and Sessions Judge Doda, Additional District and Sessions Judge Rajouri, Additional District and Sessions Judge Anantnag, Additional District and Sessions Judge Kathua, Additional District and Sessions Judge Pulwama and Additional District and Sessions Judge Baramulla to hear the corruption cases, which were already sub-judice before the designated Anti-Corruption Courts at Jammu and Srinagar.
Nevertheless, disposal of pending corruption cases could not get the required impetus mainly because of confusion at various levels, official sources told EXCELSIOR.
These seven courts were only dealing with the cases of their respective districts while as cases pertaining to other districts and even the adjoining ones continued to be placed before the courts of Special Judge (Anti-Corruption), Srinagar and Jammu thereby putting burden on these two courts, sources said. This practice was also resulting into delay in disposal of cases, which otherwise was the primary objective behind conferring powers on seven courts of Additional District and Sessions Judges, they added.
State Vigilance Organization highlighted this issue before the State Vigilance Commission, which convened a meeting of officers of Vigilance Organization, General Administration and Law Departments last year and finally the conclusion was arrived that territorial jurisdictions of these courts must be clearly defined to end the confusion.
After repeated communications between Law Department and High Court, the latter gave nod to this imperative step in the month of November last year and now Department of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs has issued a notification defining the territorial jurisdiction of courts empowered to handle corruption cases.
“In exercise of powers conferred by Section 6 read with Section 7 of the Jammu and Kashmir Criminal Law Amendment Act and in amplification of notification SRO 475 dated October 31, 2014, the Special Judges (Anti-Corruption) for trial of offences specified in Clause (a), (b) and (c) of Sub-Section (1) of Section 6 of the Act, shall have the territorial jurisdiction”, reads SRO-20 dated January 16, 2015 issued by Mohammad Ashraf Mir, Secretary to Government, Department of Law.
According to the SRO, court of Special Judge Anti-Corruption Srinagar would have jurisdiction over the districts of Srinagar, Ganderbal, Budgam, Leh and Kargil. Similarly, court of Special Judge Anti-Corruption Jammu would have territorial jurisdiction of Jammu and Samba districts.
Ist Additional District and Sessions Judge Baramulla to have territorial jurisdiction of Baramulla, Kupwara and Bandipora districts while as Anantnag and Kulgam districts would come under the jurisdiction of Additional District and Sessions Judge, Anantnag.
The districts of Pulwama and Shopian would fall under the jurisdiction of Additional District and Sessions Judge Pulwama while as Additional District and Sessions Judge Udhampur would have territorial jurisdiction over Udhampur and Reasi districts.
The districts of Rajouri and Poonch would fall under the territorial jurisdiction of Additional District and Sessions Judge Rajouri while as Additional District and Sessions Judge, Doda to have jurisdiction over districts of Doda, Kishtwar and Ramban.
With this development, disposal of pending corruption cases would get further impetus and accordingly the objective behind empowering seven courts to handle corruption cases would start yielding positive results.
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