The Jammu & Kashmir HC gave a fillip on Wednesday to CBI’s bid to re-start two 30-year-old terror cases against separatist leader Yasin Malik and 10 others by shifting Malik’s petition seeking a stay on the trial back to Jammu from Srinagar where it had been granted an interim stay by the Srinagar wing of the HC.
The high court was hearing a CBI plea seeking vacation of the stay and shifting of proceedings to Jammu.
The cases relate to the December 1989 kidnapping of Rubaiya Sayeed, daughter of the late J&K CM Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, and the killing in January 1990 of four IAF personnel in Kashmir, for which the accused have been chargesheeted by the CBI under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act. According to the CBI, Yasin Malik is the main accused in both cases. However, the Srinagar bench of the HC had in 2009 granted an interim stay of the trial before a special anti-terror court in Jammu.
A bench of Chief Justice Gita Mittal on Wednesday held that the Srinagar wing had no jurisdiction to hear and decide a case being tried in a Jammu special court. It noted that writ petitions filed by Malik and other accused “cannot be taken up for consideration at the Srinagar wing and have to be sent to the Jammu wing for hearing and decision”.
The Srinagar bench, which had stayed the trial against the accused, including Malik, in 2009, had also issued notice to the CBI on their petitions. Chief Justice Mittal clarified on Wednesday that only the Jammu wing of the HC was authorised to hear and decide any plea against the TADA court.(Agencies)
