Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Oct 23: In the light of powers having been conferred on the Additional Sessions Court to try graft cases, Special Judge Anticorruption Court, Kashmir, M L Manhas has transferred the much-publicized infamous Gulmarg land scam case to 1st Additional Sessions Judge Baramulla with the directions to all the accused named in the State Vigilance Organization FIR including the serving IAS officer Baseer Ahmed Khan to appear before the Baramulla Court on November 9, 2013.
According to the sources in judiciary, keeping in view the SRO issued by the Department of Law conferring powers on all Additional District Judges to deal with the corruption cases, the Special Judge Anticorruption Kashmir, M L Manhas has issued orders transferring the infamous Gulmarg land scam case to the court of 1st Additional Sessions Judge Baramulla in order to ensure speedy trial in the case.
The Special Judge Anticorruption Kashmir has also directed all the accused persons including the serving Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer namely Baseer Khan, who is presently District Development Commissioner Kishtwar, to appear before the court of Ist Additional Sessions Judge Baramulla, Tasleem Arif on November 9, sources said.
Besides Baseer Khan, the officials accused in the infamous Gulmarg land scam are the then Divisional Commissioner Kashmir, Mehboob Iqbal, the then Additional Deputy Commissioner Baramulla, Farooq Ahmad Shah, Garib Singh, the then Tehsildar Tangmarg, Ghulam Mohi-ud-Din Shah, the then Naib Tehsildar Kunzer, Shabir Ahmad Pir, the then Naib Tehsildar Tangmarg, Azad Farooq Naikoo, the then Girdawar Tehsil Office Tangmarg, Bashir Ahmed Mir, the then Patwari Gulmarg.
According to the challan, these accused public servants in league with each other entered into criminal conspiracy with accused beneficiaries and accordingly manipulated the records by abusing their official positions. In this way, they illegally conferred the ownership rights on 35 kanals and 6 marlas of the prime State land at Gulmarg in favour of accused beneficiaries in contravention of the provisions of the J&K State Land (Vesting of Ownership Rights to the Occupants) Act, 2001, which was otherwise not applicable in Gulmarg.
The challan against some of the accused including the then Divisional Commissioner Mehboob Iqbal and serving IAS officer Baseer Ahmed Khan (the then Deputy Commissioner Baramulla) was produced only on the intervention of High Court. The Division Bench of State High Court headed by Chief Justice M M Kumar had on August 28, 2012 directed the State Vigilance Organization to file charge-sheet against ex-IAS officer against whom no sanction was required and allowed two weeks time to refer the case of serving IAS officer to the Government of India for prosecution sanction in terms of Section 6 of J&K Prevention of Corruption Act.
According to the sources, the power to handle corruption cases was conferred on the Additional District Judges on the directions of State High Court with the objective of ensuring expeditious disposal of corruption cases. Till the issuance of SRO, only two Principles Courts and two Additional Courts were dealing with the cases relating to corruption.
“It is hoped that Special Anticorruption Courts will transfer more such cases to the Additional District Judges in order to achieve the objective mentioned in the judgment of the High Court delivered by Justice Muzaffar Hussain Attar”, sources said.
In the judgement, Justice Attar had observed, “the huge pendency of corruption cases is cause of enormous delay in the disposal of such cases and resultantly the accused are the only beneficiary of the delayed disposal of cases”, adding “since the acquittal of the accused has the affect of encouraging corruption in the society, the State has to create necessary paraphernalia and create more courts for exclusively dealing with the offences punishable under the Prevention of Corruption Act”.
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