New Delhi- The Supreme Court on Thursday said it will consider listing a plea seeking time-bound restoration of statehood to Jammu and Kashmir.
Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for applicants, urged a bench comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra that the plea needed an urgent hearing.
“There is an MA (Miscellaneous Application) for conferring statehood. It was noted (in last year’s judgement) that it has to be time-bound,” the senior lawyer said.
“I will deal with it,” the CJI said.
The fresh application was filed by Zahoor Ahmad Bhat, an academician, and Khurshaid Ahmad Malik, a socio-political activist, in Jammu and Kashmir.
On December 11, 2023, the Supreme Court had unanimously upheld the revocation of Article 370 of the Constitution, which accorded a special status to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir, in 2019 and ordered that assembly elections be held there by September 2024. The court had also said that Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood should be restored “at the earliest”.
‘Constitutional Misdemeanour’, Says Sibal
Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Thursday said it was a “constitutional misdemeanour” to have reduced Jammu and Kashmir to a Union Territory and asserted that it was time to restore its statehood.
His remarks come a day after National Conference leader Omar Abdullah took oath as the chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, heading the first elected government in the union territory since 2019 when its special status was revoked.
As Jammu and Kashmir turned another page in its troubled history, the 54-year-old Abdullah was sworn in along with five other ministers, three from Jammu region and two from the Kashmir Valley.
In a post on X, Sibal said, “It was a constitutional misdemeanour to have reduced the state of J&K to a Union Territory. It was wrong for the Supreme Court not to have decided that issue.”
“Time to restore statehood. This is the constitutional right of the people of J&K,” the former Union minister asserted.
LG Manoj Sinha administered the oath of office and secrecy to Abdullah and his ministers at the Sher-e-Kashmir International Convention Centre along the banks of the Dal Lake.
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