NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday said it will take a decision on the early listing of petitions challenging the Centre's decision to abrogate provisions of Article 370 which had given special status to Jammu and Kashmir.
The plea was mentioned by Senior Advocate Raju Ramachandran before the bench also comprising Justices PS Narasimha and JB Pardiwala.
Considering senior counsel’s submissions, CJI DY Chandrachud said, “I will take a call.”
The pleas were last listed on March 2, 2020, when the constitution bench had held that there was no need to refer the matter regarding the challenging to the Presidential Orders issued under Article 370 to a larger Bench.
Earlier when the pleas were mentioned before the bench headed by CJI DY Chandrachud, the judge while agreeing to consider listing the case had said, “We’ll examine and give a date.”
In wake of the amendments, many petitions were filed before the Supreme Court, praying that the Presidential Orders issued under Article 370, repealing the special status of the Jammu and Kashmir, and the J&K (Reorganisation) Act, 2019, be declared unconstitutional. One of the pleas averred that it was "striking at the heart of the principles on which the State of J&K had integrated".
The hearing had commenced on December 10, 2019 - four months after the repeal of the J&K special status - before a Constitution Bench comprising Justices N V Ramana (now retired), SK Kaul, R Subhash Reddy (now retired), B R Gavai and Surya Kant. Some of the petitioners during the course of the hearing had however sought for reference of the matter to a 7-judge Bench in light of the contrasting opinions expressed by two coordinate benches of the Supreme Court in the cases of Prem Nath Kaul and Sampath Prakash which was refused by March 2, 2020 order.
By abrogating Article 370, the Central government revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.
NGO, People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL), Jammu and Kashmir High Court Bar Association, and an intervenor had sought referring of the matter to a larger bench on grounds that two judgements of the apex court -- Prem Nath Kaul versus Jammu and Kashmir in 1959 and Sampat Prakash versus Jammu and Kashmir in 1970 -- which dealt with the issue of Article 370 conflicted each other and therefore, the current bench of five judges could not hear the issue.
Disagreeing with the petitioners, the bench had said it was of the opinion that "there is no conflict between the judgements".
(With inputs from PTI)