An application for early hearing of the petitions challenging the promulgation of the Constitution (Application to Jammu Kashmir) Order, 2019 amending Article 367 of the Constitution of India and abrogating Article 370 has been filed in the Supreme Court.
The application has been filed by one Shakir Shabir, who had challenged the revocation of Article 370 in the top court last year.
The application states that several legislations have been passed since August 5, 2019 and key changes are being effected by the government in J&K which risks lending permanency to initial impugned order passed on 5 August 2020. The applicant has, therefore, raised the apprehension that “mere passage of time” can render the abrogation of Article 370 permanent making the petitions infructuous.
“All consequent acts of the govt. deriving authority from such impugned order or subsequent orders which have also come to be challenged in several petitions before this Hon’ble Court, are also illegal and void ab initio and by the mere passage of time, such illegal and unconstitutional actions risk to render the captioned petition infructuous while rendering permanency to the impugned order(s),” reads the application
The projected intent behind the revocation of Article 370 was “betterment of the populace of the erstwhile State of Jammu & Kashmir.” However, “the truth remains that it is the very people who are presently suffering in the midst,” the plea states.
“Not only due to repeated internet shutdowns and reduced internet speeds have the students and businesses being suffering in Jammu and Kashmir, the impugned order and the slew of restrictions continually damage the economy as well as everyday life of the locals, who have been completely kept away from the entire process despite the fact that each change under the laws detrimentally effects the locals at an individualistic level,”
The applicant has, therefore, sought urgent hearing of the challenge to abrogation of Article 370 pointing out that courts are currently functioning at their full capacity via virtual mode even though limited matters were being heard during the initial stages of lockdown.
In March this year, a 5-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme court had held that there was no need to refer the batch of petitions challenging Article 370 to a 7-judge constitution bench.
This ruling had come after a few petitioners sought reference of the case to a 7-judge bench contending that there is a conflict between two judgments of the Supreme Court – Prem Nath Kaul v. State of Jammu & Kashmir and Sampat Prakash v. State of Jammu & Kashmir. Both these judgments were rendered by 5-judge benches and dealt with the interpretation of Article 370.
However, the 5-judge bench of Justices NV Ramana, Sanjay Kishan Kaul, R Subhash Reddy, BR Gavai, and Surya Kant, which was hearing the case, declined to refer the matter to a larger bench holding that there is no conflict between the two judgments.