The Supreme Court on Thursday posted for next month, hearing on appeals filed by a number of Roshni Act beneficiaries, who claim they are authorised occupants and leaseholders of Nazool land in Jammu and Kashmir.
A bench headed by Justice NV Ramana recorded Solicitor General Tushar Mehta's statement that no coercive action will be taken for now against the beneficiaries. It asked the High Court to decide the review petitions on December 21.
The bench noted that review petitions are pending in the High Court and that they be decided before the apex court hears the appeals. It allowed beneficiaries (who have not filed yet) to file review petitions in the High Court.
"Let the review petitions be decided by the Jammu and Kashmir High Court on December 21. The pendency of this case (in apex court) will not come in way of any of these petitioners approaching the Jammu and Kashmir High Court in a review petition," the bench said while posting the matter for further hearing in the last week of January.
Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the petitioners, argued that the Jammu and Kashmir High Court was looking at the unauthorised encroachment of the land, but added that the petitioners have been lawful occupants.
Mehta said that the Jammu and Kashmir government cannot stop lawful occupants, but added that land grabbers cannot be sparred.
A group of beneficiaries of the Roshni Act has approached the top court against the High Court order to scrap the Jammu and Kashmir State Land (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Act, 2001, which is also knows as the Roshni Act.
They told the apex court that they are "authorised occupants and leaseholders of Nazool land" and they were not even heard by the High Court before it passed the directions.
The High Court had, on October 9, held that the Jammu and Kashmir State Land (Vesting of Ownership to the Occupants) Act 2001, (Roshni Act) is completely "unconstitutional" and all acts done under it or amendments thereunder are also unconstitutional and void.
A division bench Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice Rajesh Bindal had directed CBI to conduct in depth inquiry into the matter. The bench had said the acts and omissions of officials and the encroachers/ occupants amounted to serious criminal offences, necessitating inquiry, investigation and criminal prosecutions.
Roshni Act was passed by Jammu and Kashmir legislature in 2001 to confer ownership rights on occupants of State land to raise Rs 25,000 crore for hydel projects, but only Rs 76 crore was collected. In 2018, the then Lieutenant Governor repealed the Act. Later, the High Court, while acting on PIL, scrapped the Act and directed the authorities to retrieve the land from the occupants.
The Jammu and Kashmir administration has named many politicians, businessmen, bureaucrats and officials as "illegal land encroachers" in the Union Territory under the Act.
( With inputs from ANI )
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