Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Nov 3: 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 Dhiraj Singh Thakur and Justice B S Walia today directed the Commissioner/ Secretary Revenue to file report within four weeks with regard to alienation of land measuring 724 kanals to SRK Associates allegedly in contravention of the ceiling prescribed under J&K Agrarian Reforms Act, Big Landed Estates Abolition Act and other land laws/rules governing the field.
Division Bench also directed Senior AAG S S Nanda and Advocate Ahtsham Bhat appearing for GAD to file their response before next date to Miscellaneous Petition No.4/2015 seeking appropriate action against all those officers/officials of JDA who miserably failed to take action against SRK Associates and Ram Kumar, son of Paras Ram (Partner of SRK Associates) as directed by the Housing and Urban Development Department vide order No.U&D/ 15/ 2008/ JDA/AS-32 dated 05-02-2008.
When the PIL came up for hearing, Advocate Sheikh Shakeel Ahmed with Advocates Rahul Raina and Suraj Singh appearing for the petitioner Prof S K Bhalla, drew the attention of the Division Bench towards Govt. Order No.151-Rev(S) of 2015 dated October, 7, 2015 whereby Secretary to Govt. Revenue Department appointed Shahid Mehmood, SDM Jammu (South) as enquiry officer to enquire into the alienation of land measuring 724 kanals in village Sunjwan to SRK Associates in violation of J&K Agrarian Reforms Act and Big Landed Estates Abolition Act.
“The 15 days time limit fixed by the Revenue Department has already expired and the enquiry has not been completed till date. Since the builder is highly influential as such a time bound direction for completion of enquiry be issued”, Advocate Ahmad said.
At this stage, Senior Advocate L K Sharma appearing for M/s SRK Associates submitted that he has already filed detailed reply to MP No.4/2015 and sought adjudication of the matter. He leveled serious allegations against the petitioner and submitted that the scope of the PIL be not enlarged as the petitioner has raised the issue of excess land just to thwart the disposal of the main petition.
“The instant PIL which is abuse of process of law may be dismissed with heavy costs”, Senior Counsel L K Sharma said, adding “the petitioner has filed many such petitions just to gain publicity and the petitions are resulting in wastage of court time and causing harassment to innocent people like SRK Associates.”
While resisting the arguments of Senior Advocate L K Sharma, Advocate Sheikh Shakeel Ahmed submitted, “no motives can be attributed to the petitioner who acted as a whistleblower in the Chatta Sunjwan land scam which had been hushed up due to the influence garnered by the builder”, adding “because of the instant PIL the then Divisional Commissioner Shantmanu submitted his report establishing illegal transfer of 20 kanals of land in favour of SRK Associates and the Government also entrusted the probe to Crime Branch for indepth investigation”.
He further further submitted that the people of the State have a right to know about the proceedings in a PIL involving land scam, adding “the private builder is scary of the ongoing probe as he has acquired the land illegally in contravention of the ceiling prescribed under J&K Agrarian Reforms Act”.
After heated arguments from both the sides, Division Bench directed for filing of report by SDM South within four weeks. The DB further directed Senior AAG S S Nanda and Advocate Ahtsham Bhat to file their response to MP No.4/2015 before the adjourned date of hearing.
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