Excelsior Correspondent
Srinagar, Sept 12: The High Court has granted last opportunity to then Divisional Commissioner Kashmir Mehboob Iqbal to submit his stand before the court to the plea of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) seeking transfer of case with regard to transferring State Land at Gulmarg to the private persons during his tenure.
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Justice Rajnesh Oswal partly heard the matter. But none was present on behalf of the respondent-Iqbal and the court said the case be heard and considered without hearing him in case he or his counsel is not present on the next date.
Court directed the Registry that his counsel be served through his email. “Await appearance of Respondent-2. It is made clear that, in the event, non appears on behalf of Respondent-2, the matter shall be considered on the basis of record available. The Counsel representing Respondent-2 be informed through mail”, Justice Oswal said.
The petition has been preferred by the CBI against the order of Special Judge Anti-Corruption cases whereby the trial court has rejected the two-applications moved by the CBI seeking therein that the trial of the case be transferred to Special Judge Anti-Corruption Cases Srinagar and original documents as submitted earlier by the ACB be provided to the CBI for further investigation as directed by the High Court.
The FIR was lodged on the basis of verification conducted by VoK into the allegations that officers and officials of Revenue department and Tourism department by abuse of their official position vested ownership rights in favour of some occupants of the State land at Gulmarg in the year 2008 under Roshni Act.
On the completion of the investigation as many as 19 accused persons including Iqbal (the then Divisional Commissioner Kashmir), Farooq Ahmad Shah (the then Deputy Commissioner Baramulla) and Baseer Ahmad Khan (the then Deputy Commissioner Baramulla) were charge sheeted before the Special Court of Anti-Corruption Srinagar on 26.3.2013 for the commission of offence under Section 120-B r/w 468 rpc and Section 5(2) r/w 5(1) of the Prevention of Corruption Act and Section 17 of the Roshni Act.
It was on the direction of High Court vide order dated 9.10.2020, the CBI re-registered FIR 8/209 of P/S VoK as regular case on 18.2.2021 against Mehboob Iqbal (the then Div Com Kmr) and others.
The Special Judge Baramulla on 25.5.2021 dismissed both applications on the grounds that there is no provision for transferring of sub-judice case by any court to the court of coordinate jurisdiction and the High Court vide order dated 9.10.2020 has not given any specific direction for transferring the charge sheet to Special Judge, CBI Srinagar.
Aggrieved of the impugned order dated 25.5.2021 passed by the Special judge Anti-Corruption Baramulla, the present writ petition was preferred. The High Court in its judgment on 9.10.2020 had directed that all cases in which charge sheets stand filed by the ACB in the courts, the CBI shall conduct further and thorough investigation and if necessary, file additional charge sheets in those cases.
CBI has re-registered the case and has initiated its investigation on the orders of the High Court. CBI submitted that further investigation is not feasible in absence of the original documents which were filed by the VoK and are presently lying in the case titled VoK Vs Mehboob Iqbal & Ors pending before Special Judge Anti-Corruption Baramulla.
The trial court while rejecting applications of CBI had observed that the case is pending at the stage of arguments on the charge/discharge and applications of the CBI for providing the documents for conducting further investigation cannot be entertained at this stage.
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