Cases to be heard by courts where detenue is lodged
By News Agency of Kashmir,
Jammu : In an important decision, Supreme Court of India has directed the Jammu and Kashmir government to ensure disposal of pending cases against the all the detenues lodged in various jails across the country under Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act within one year.
A Bench of Apex Court comprising Justice BN Agarwal and Justice GS Sanghvi passed the direction in a writ petition filed by Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party chief Prof Bhim Singh.
The court further directed that the cases shall be heard and disposed off by the courts under whose jurisdiction the detenue was lodged. The state government was asked to dispatch the connected record to the concerned court within the period of one month.
Prof Singh, who also heads the Justice Legal Aid Committee, has challenged the dentition of over one hundred persons in various jails across the county under Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act.
Beside other points, the petitioner has challenged the detention on the ground that under no person, irrespective of his nationality, can be detained under PSA beyond two years time period. It was claimed in the petition that number of people were undergoing detention under PSA from last more than ten years which was in clear violation of Article 21 of the constitution.
A legal expert told News Agency of Kashmir that the direction has come in the backdrop of a recent decision by a division bench of the Supreme Court comprising Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan and Justice CK Thakur. “The Bench had directed the Punjab government to release Baba Amrinder Singh with immediate affect and the court took serious note of the practice adopted by the law enforcing agencies to detain people behind bars for years without any trial”.