india

Updated: Mar 15, 2019 13:42 IST

The Jammu and Kashmir high court on Wednesday transferred cases related to kidnapping of Rubaiya Sayeed, daughter of then Union home minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, and killing of four Indian Air Force (IAF) personnel in Srinagar – in which JKLF chairman Mohammad Yasin Malik and others are accused – to its Jammu wing.

Chief justice Gita Mittal passed the order after hearing arguments on two applications filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which had sought the transfer of the petitions to the high court’s Jammu wing.

“The records of the writ petitions would require to be forthwith sent to the Jammu wing of the high court of Jammu and Kashmir for hearing and decision…,” chief justice Mittal said.

The chief justice directed the registrar judicial, Srinagar, to take “immediate steps in the matter for conveying the records to the Jammu wing and ensuring that no delay results in the hearing of the matters.”

“The registrar judicial, Jammu, shall inform counsels for the parties in the writ petitions regarding the listing of the case,” she said.

The CBI, through its counsel TM Shamsi, had argued that “entire records of the case are located at Jammu” and “that the petitioners are influential persons who were able to delay the trial for a decade (from 1990 to 2009) and then the proceedings before the writ court after having obtained an interim order of stay of the trials on November 26, 2009.” Opposing CBI contentions, ZA Shah, counsel for the accused, said the writ petitions were filed in the Srinagar wing of the high court after obtaining permission from the then chief justice of the court on May 4, 2009. The writ petitions were listed for March 14, 2019 and it would be “improper” to transfer the cases to the Jammu wing of the high court at this stage, he said.

The Srinagar wing of the Jammu and Kashmir HC had in April 2009 stayed the trial in a designated TADA court in Jammu in the cases based on CBI charge sheet.

The HC had then directed that “proceedings before the trial court shall remain in abeyance” and there was no further movement on the writ petitions which have remained pending ever since.

Rubaiya Sayeed was kidnapped in Srinagar on December 8, 1989, within days of her father becoming the home minister. She was released on December 13 in exchange of five militants.

On January 25, 1990, militants gunned down Squadron Leader Ravi Khanna, corporal DB Singh, corporal Uday Shankar and Airman Azad Ahmad when over 40 IAF personnel were waiting for their morning bus at Rawalpora Chowk, Srinagar.