PIL highlighting encroachment of 20 lakh kanals of land
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Aug 18: In a significant order, a Division Bench of the High Court comprising Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice Vinod Chatterji Koul has imposed Rs 10,000 cost each on the Jammu Development Authority and Revenue Department for non-filing of reply in a PIL highlighting encroachment of 20 lakh kanals of land.
When the PIL came up for hearing, Advocate Sheikh Shakeel Ahmed with Advocates Supriya Chouhan, Mohd Zulkarnain Choudhary and Irtiza Mushtaq appearing for the petitioner invited the attention of the Division Bench towards Civil Miscellaneous Application No. 1972/2020 wherein the petitioner has highlighted the encroachment of 154 kanal of JDA land situated at Village Deeli Jammu.
The petitioner has also sought the quashment of Order No. DCJ/HQA/Roshni/08/676-77 dated June 9, 2008 whereby the then Deputy Commissioner, Jammu Hirdesh Kumar Singh conferred ownership rights with regard to land in contravention of the Roshni Scheme.
Advocate Ahmed further submitted that it was on March 12, 2020, the Division Bench had issued notices to JDA and Revenue Department for filing reply to the application and further time was granted to Senior AAG S S Nanda and Advocate Adarsh Sharma appearing for Revenue Department/ JDA on 18th March 2020 but despite the passage of 5 months replies have not been filed.
Taking serious note of the lapse on the part of JDA and Revenue Department and after expressing displeasure/anguish, the DB observed, “sufficient time has been wasted awaiting reply of the respondents. However, inasmuch we cannot proceed in the matter without a reply, we give last opportunity to the respondents to file a reply within a period of 2 weeks from today subject to payment of costs of Rs 10,000 each by the JDA and the Revenue Department”.
Division Bench further ordered that in the reply the JDA/Revenue Department shall disclose the full details of the persons in whose favour the encroachment of the lands of the JDA stands regularized.
Advocate Ahmed further pointed out that in terms of order dated March 18, 2020 the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has filed a status report through AAG Raman Sharma giving the current status of all the Roshni scam related FIRs. Since the status report was not on the record, the Division Bench directed the Registry to attach the status report which is available on the paper book.
Division Bench also took serious note of delay in grant of sanction for prosecution in FIR No. 18/2014 P/S VOK, FIR No. 19/2014 P/S VOK and FIR No. 15/2014 P/S VOJ wherein the authorities are sleeping over the matter from 2016-18. Division Bench further directed that the respondents ACB/ State Government shall prepare a date-wise report regarding the manner in which the files have been processed by the authorities after they were sent by the prosecuting agency seeking sanction for prosecution.
“We shall be informed as to why such a serious matter regarding sanction for prosecution has been kept pending inasmuch as 4 years and 2 years”, the DB said, adding “we will consider on the next date as to why officers who have delayed processing of sanction requests should not be considered for prosecution as abettors to the offences in collusion with the offenders”.
Follow our WhatsApp channel