Challenge to scrapping Article 370 – these are the 10 petitions SC will hear today

All the petitions challenge scrapping of Article 370 and the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, which has divided the state into two UTs.

File photo of the Supreme Court of India | Manisha Mondal | ThePrint

New Delhi: A five-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court will Tuesday begin hearing petitions challenging the Constitutional validity of the scrapping of Article 370 that had granted ‘special status’ to Jammu and Kashmir.

A bench comprising Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and Justices S.A. Bobde and S. Abdul Nazeer had referred the matters to the Constitutional Bench on 28 August.

The five-judge bench comprises of Justices N.V. Rama, S.K. Kaul, R. Subhash Kaul, B.R. Gavai and Surya Kant. 

The scrapping of J&K’s special status

An order was issued by President Ram Nath Kovind on 5 August under Article 370(1) of the Constitution of India, in effect nullifying Article 35A and making provisions of the Indian Constitution applicable to Jammu and Kashmir. 

This was followed by another Presidential Order on 6 August, reading down Article 370 to revoke the special status granted to Jammu and Kashmir. 

Subsequently, on 9 August, the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, received the President’s assent, bifurcating the state into the Union Territory of Ladakh, comprising Kargil and Leh districts, and the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, comprising the territories of the existing state of Jammu and Kashmir other than Kargil and Leh.

Since then, several petitions have been filed in the Supreme Court, challenging the scrapping of Article 370, the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, and the communication blackout in the Valley. 

The 10 petitions listed before the Constitution Bench

• Manohar Lal Sharma: Serial PIL petitioner advocate M.L. Sharma was the first to move the apex court with a petition challenging the Presidential Order on Article 370. Sharma has called the Presidential Order “unconstitutional” and has contended that the government should have taken the parliamentary route to amend the article instead.

 

• Farooq Ahmad Dar: The second listed petition has been filed by Dar. Details of this petition were not available. 

 

• Shakir Shabir: In his petition, Kashmiri lawyer Shabir has claimed that Article 367, which was amended through the Presidential Order, could not have been amended without concurrence of the State Assembly. He has asserted that the approval from the State Assembly was necessary in order to respect the will of the people, and has called the Centre’s actions “reckless, absent of any power or constitutional authority”.

 

• Soayib Qureshi: The petition filed by lawyer Qureshi argues that the Presidential proclamation of governor’s rule in the state had lapsed in June. His argument contends that there was no legal basis for the Presidential Order as there was no valid governor’s rule in the State at the time of issuance of the Order. 

 

• Mohd Akbar Lone and Hasnain Masoodi: Besides challenging the Presidential Order, the petition filed by the two National Conference MPs also challenges the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019.

 

• Inder Salim and Satish Jacob: This petition also challenges the Presidential Order and the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019. Tickoo is a Kashmiri writer while Jacob is a veteran journalist.

 

• Former military officers and bureaucrats: This petition has been filed by former home ministry-appointed interlocutor Radha Kumar, former Air Vice Marshal Kapil Kak, retired Major General Ashok Mehta and former IAS officers Hindal Haidar Tyabji, Amitabha Pande and Gopal Pillai. This petition also challenges the Presidential Order and the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019.

 

• Shah Faesal, Shehla Rashid and five others: This petition challenges the Presidential Order and the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019. The petitioners allege that downgrading a state to two Union Territories without the consultation of its elected representatives violates the principle of federalism. 

 

• Muzzafar Iqbal Khan: The retired judge of a district court in Jammu and Kashmir has challenged the Presidential Order on the ground that it could not have been passed without consulting the State Assembly.

 

• Jammu and Kashmir Peoples Conference: This petition challenges the Presidential Order, as also the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019. It asserts that Parliament could not have taken a “short cut” route to scrap Article 370, and points out that the order was issued pursuant to the “concurrence” of the government of Jammu and Kashmir despite there being no popularly-elected government in the state.