Callousness despite alarming rise in activities of drug cartels
Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Aug 26: Notwithstanding alarming rise in activities of drug cartels and subsequent registration of cases under Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPSA), the Government is willfully ignoring the directions of Apex Court of the country and J&K High Court on establishment of Special Courts, which otherwise are imperative to ensure speedy trial in such cases and subsequent punishment to involved persons.
In Thana Singh Versus Central Bureau of Narcotics case, a Supreme Court Bench comprising Justice D K Jain and Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar on January 23, 2013 had observed that some States in the country including Jammu and Kashmir don’t have the necessary NDPS courts to deal with the volume of cases under Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act.
The Apex Court had directed these States including Jammu and Kashmir (where the pendency of cases over five years was stated to be high) to establish Special Courts to deal exclusively with offences under NDPA Act. “The number of these courts must be proportionate to and sufficient for handling the volume of pending cases”, reads the judgment of Supreme Court.
However, the directions of the Supreme Court failed to receive due attention of the concerned authorities as a result of which speedy disposal of cases registered under NDPS Act remained a dream, official sources told EXCELSIOR.
Thereafter, Division Bench of State High Court headed by the then Chief Justice M M Kumar and Justice Tashi Rabstan while dealing with a criminal acquittal appeal took serious note of non-compliance of the Apex Court directions.
“The conviction rate in NDPSA cases is as low as 10% to 12% and in a large number of cases the trial ends up in acquittal of the accused on account of tardy investigation which leads to the impression that it has either been done deliberately or there is lack of investigation skill. Moreover, we have noticed that the tools of investigation appear to be archaic and those at the helm of affairs are not well trained”, the DB had observed in its order dated July 10, 2014.
Accordingly, the DB had directed the Chief Secretary, Home Secretary and Law Secretary to ensure compliance to the directions of Apex Court by establishing Special Courts to exclusively deal with NDPSA cases.
However, dilly dallying approach towards establishment of Special Courts continued till date despite the fact that even on administrative side the J&K High Court through Registrar General has sent a number of communications to the Law Department for compliance to the directions of Apex Court as well as highest court of the State during the past over three years, sources said.
“Actually, the Law Department had drafted a proposal for establishment of two Special Courts in each province of Jammu and Kashmir and even forwarded the same to the Finance Department for its concurrence but the latter first desired to have some information relating to number of NDPSA cases and their disposal rate by the routine courts and then on obtaining this information brushed the matter under carpet”, sources said while disclosing that during the past quite long time even discussion has not been held on this vital aspect what to talk of implementing the directions of the Supreme Court and J&K High Court.
Actually there was no need of waiting for the directions from the Supreme Court as well as High Court of Jammu and Kashmir as Section 36 of Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act clearly states: “Government may, for the purpose of providing speedy trial of the offences under this Act, by notification in the Official Gazette, constitute as many Special Courts as may be necessary for such area or areas as may be specified in the notification. The Special Court shall consist of a single Judge who shall be appointed by the Government with the concurrence of the Chief Justice of the High Court”.
In response to a question, sources said that in the absence of Special Courts, the Courts of District and Sessions Judges are dealing with NDPSA cases but because of workload of other cases they are finding it difficult to ensure speedy trial in NDPSA cases. “Not only Special Courts even Special Public Prosecutors, who are well versed with the NDPS Act, and Special Investigators are required so that cases don’t end up in acquittals”, sources said while pointing towards provisions in this regard under the NDPS Act.
“The callousness on the part of Government is notwithstanding the fact that activities of drug cartels are on continuous rise in the length and breadth of Jammu and Kashmir and number of drug addicts is also increasing considerably”, sources said.
As reported exclusively by EXCELSIOR on June 5, 2017, during the period between January 1, 2015 and December 31, 2015 a total of 4282 kilograms of narcotic drugs were seized across Jammu and Kashmir and 588 cases were registered under NDPSA against 863 persons.
However, during the period between January 1, 2016 and December 31, 2016 the seizure of narcotic drugs was increased to 5393 kilograms. This includes over 180 kilograms of charas, 546 kilograms of fuki, 4161 kilograms of poppy straw, 148 kilograms of brown sugar, 25 kilograms of heroin, 8 kilograms of opium/powder and 133 kilograms of Ganja.
Not only narcotics, huge quantity of pharmaceutical intoxicants were also seized during this period from different parts of Jammu and Kashmir. The seizure includes 106965 capsules/tablets and 15218 bottles of syrup.
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