Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 12: 1st Additional Sessions Judge Jammu, Bala Joyti today dismissed the appeals filed by three ex-Ministers namely Shabir Ahmed, Yogesh Sawhney and Dr Manohar Lal and one former MLA namely Aijaz Jan and directed them to vacate accommodation within 15 days failing which respondents will be at liberty to initiate any coercive process under law.
Through their separate appeals filed under Section 12 of J&K Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorized Occupants) Act, 1998, these ex-Ministers and MLA had challenged the action of the respondents for evicting them.
While dismissing the appeals filed by the appellants, 1st Additional Sessions Judge Jammu, Bala Joyti observed, “appellants cease to hold any Public Office. Threat perception, if any, could be connected to their Ministerial position and must have faded by now as they are not even MLAs anymore”.
“Threat perception to appellants that is vociferously canvassed in court is now only a misconceived one and cannot be considered by this court for want of any evidence of such threat still prevailing as such they must vacate accommodation so that the Government agency/respondent is in a position to accommodate present MLAs”, the Judge said, adding “there is no reasonable and justifiable ground pleaded in memo of appeal or proved to be otherwise”.
“The provisions of the PPA 1988 are meant to strictly deal with unauthorized occupants of Government accommodation so much so that even no appeal is permissible in the Act against the judgment passed in appeal and criminal case can be lodged against unauthorized occupant”, the court said, adding “Section 14 of PPA provides punishment up to 6 months or fine and Section 15 of the Act declares offences to be cognizable. This apart, Section 447-A RPC read with Section 441-A RPC takes care of criminal trespass. Obvious therefore as a corollary of law if the provisions of a legislation are stringent, their implementation must be stricter”.
With these observations, court dismissed all the appeals.
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