Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, May 27: In the much publicized Public Interest Litigation (PIL) highlighting alleged hushing up of Chatta Sunjwan land scam, Division Bench of the State High Court comprising Justice Ali Mohammad Magrey and Justice B S Walia today directed Commissioner /Secretary Revenue Department to file updated status report in terms of the last order, dated April, 28, 2016 within two weeks or appear in person on the next date of hearing.
After hearing Advocate Sheikh Shakeel Ahmed with Advocates Irfaan Mohammad Khan and Supriya Singh Chouhan appearing for the petitioner and Deputy Advocate General Deepika Mahajan appearing vice Senior AAG S S Nanda for Revenue Department, Senior Advocate M A Goni with Advocate Rahul Pant appearing for newly impleaded Revenue officials and Advocate Adarsh Sharma appearing for JDA, Division Bench, in the open court, expressed its displeasure over non-filing of the status report by the Commissioner/ Secretary Revenue Department.
Earlier, Advocate Ahmed submitted that the Revenue Secretary was under an obligation to file the status report with regard to two issues, one pertaining to Govt. Order No.44 Rev(S) of 2016 dated 01-04-2016 whereby the Revenue Department appointed Regional Director, Settlement and Survey Jammu as Inquiry Officer to fix the responsibility and identify the officers/officials who have tampered the revenue records of village Sunjwan, Jammu as pointed out by the then Divisional Commissioner Jammu in his inquiry report.
He further submitted that the Regional Director Settlement and Survey Jammu had been directed to submit his inquiry report/findings within a period of 15 days but despite the expiry of almost two months the inquiry report is yet to see the light of the day. He further submitted that time bound directions be issued to the Revenue Secretary and the Regional Director Settlement and Survey Jammu to produce before the court the inquiry report which will indicate the names of the Revenue officers/officials involved in the tampering of the revenue record.
He further submitted that the Revenue Secretary as per the previous order was also under an obligation to file an updated status report with regard to the alienation of land measuring 724 Kanals situated in village Sunjwan in favour of M/s SRK Associates as the Revenue Secretary had himself found discrepancies in the inquiry report submitted by Shahid Mehmood, Sub-Divisional Magistrate Jammu (South).
After considering the submissions of Advocate Ahmed, Division Bench granted two weeks time to Commissioner /Secretary to Govt. of J&K, Revenue Department for filing updated status report in terms of the last order dated April, 28, 2016.
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