Supreme Court agrees to early listing of petitions challenging abrogation of Article 370

New Delhi, December 14

The Supreme Court on Wednesday said it would consider a plea for early listing of petitions challenging the Centre’s decision to nullify Article 370 of the Constitution which gave special status to Jammu and Kashmir.

“We will examine and give a date,” a Bench led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud told the counsel for intervenor Radha Kumar who wanted early listing of petitions against abrogation of Article 370.

The Supreme Court on September 23 agreed to take up after Dussehra the petitions challenging the validity of nullification of Article 370 and bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories hanging fire for almost three years.

The top court had on August 28, 2019 referred petitions challenging Presidential Orders nullifying Article 370 of the Constitution and bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories to a five-judge Constitution Bench. In March 2020, it had refused to refer it to a larger Bench of seven judges.

The petitions were originally referred to a Constitution Bench led by Justice NV Ramana (since retired) in 2019 by the then CJI Ranjan Gogoi.

Besides Justice Ramana, Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, R Subhash Reddy, B R Gavai, and Surya Kant were part of the bench.

Now, the five-judge Bench will have to be reconstituted in view of Justice the retirement of Justice Reddy (on January 4, 2022) and CJI NV Raman (on August 27, 2022).

The Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, which divided the state into two union territories – Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, has already been acted upon. The changes came into effect on October 31, 2019 after being notified in the official gazette.

“The Supreme Court can always turn the clock back,” a five-judge Constitution Bench had said this on 1 October 2020 when it took up the petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the J&K Reorganisation Act 2019 and the August 5 Presidential Orders nullifying Article 370 that gave special status to Jammu and Kashmir.

Since then, a delimitation exercise has been completed in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir and the number of seats increased from 83 to 90 (excluding 24 seats in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir).

There are around two dozen petitions challenging the Presidential Order nullifying Article 370, including those by Delhi-based advocate ML Sharma, Jammu and Kashmir-based lawyer Shakir Shabir, National Conference Lok Sabha MPs Mohammad Akbar Lone and Justice (Retd) Hasnain Masoodi, bureaucrat-turned-politician Shah Faesal and his party colleague Shehla Rashid.

There is another PIL filed by former interlocutor for Jammu and Kashmir Radha Kumar, Air Vice Marshal (Retd) Kapil Kak, Major General (Retd) Ashok Mehta, and former IAS officers Hindal Haidar Tyabji, Amitabha Pande and Gopal Pillai who have urged the top court to declare the August 5 Presidential Orders be declared “unconstitutional, void and inoperative”.

As the petitions didn’t get listed after March 2, 2020, former Jammu and Kashmir MLA Mohammed Yousuf Tarigami had moved the Supreme Court in August last year seeking an early hearing of petitions challenging the validity of abrogation of special status of the erstwhile state.

Contending that despite the pendency of petitions challenging the nullification of Article 370 and bifurcation of the state into two union territories, the Centre has taken the several irreversible steps, Tarigami had said if the matters were not heard urgently, grave injustice will be caused.