The Supreme Court of India on Thursday refrained from examining the appeals related to Roshni Land Act till the Jammu Kashmir (J&K) High Court decides the review petition filed against its October 9 judgment on the case.
The order was passed by a three-judge Bench in a batch of appeals filed against the judgment of the High Court ordering a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the alleged scam.
The Supreme Court said that the Union Territory of Jammu Kashmir and various beneficiaries under the Roshni Act have filed review petitions against the High Court judgment which is pending before the High Court.
It, therefore, remarked that there cannot be parallel proceedings on the same subject matter.
The Court adjourned the case to be heard in the final week of January 2021.
The appellants before the Supreme Court are beneficiaries under the Roshni Act who are likely to lose their land after the High Court judgment ordered retrieval of land allotted under the Act.
The Roshni land act was thrust into spotlight after a judgment was delivered by the Jammu & Kashmir High Court on October 9, 2020 ordering a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
The judgment came nine years after the first petition in this regard was filed before the High Court in 2011 and multiple orders by High Court in this regard went unheeded by government authorities.
The genesis of the act lies in the Jammu and Kashmir State Land (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Act, 2001 known popularly as ‘Roshni Act’.
The Act provided for vesting of government lands in encroachers subject to encroachers paying a price determined by the government.