The judicial challenge to the validity of the Article 35A of the Constitution kept Kashmir on the boil for the second day even as the Supreme Court on Monday decided to take up the case for hearing in the last week of this month despite appeal by the Centre and the Jammu & Kashmir Government to post it after October in view of the local body elections in the State.
Article 35A empowers the J&K legislature to define “permanent residents” of the State and provide special rights and privileges to those permanent residents.
The petitioner NGO “We the Citizens” along with a few other individuals have sought scrapping of Article 35A on the ground that it empowers the State to define and regulate the rights and privileges of the permanent residents, particularly in regard to the acquisition of immovable property, appointments to services and like matters. The Article denies property rights to a woman who marries a person from outside the State. Their marriage would result in automatic forfeiture of her right on parental property.
A Bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice AM Khanwilkar could not take up the petitions challenging the validity of Article 35A on Monday in the absence of Justice DY Chandrachud, the third member on the Bench.
Posting the case in the week commencing August 27, the CJI said the three-judge Bench will decided if it is required to refer the matter to a five-judge Constitution Bench to examine whether Article 35A violates the basic structure of the Constitution.
Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Tushar Mehta appearing for the J&K Government sought an adjournment citing local body elections in September. Attorney General KK Venugopal supported the prayer of the State. However, petitioners demanded early listing of the case.
The court declined their prayers as also appeal by the petitioner for urgent hearing, saying, “The provision under challenge has remained in the State since 1954 while the petitions challenging it were filed only in 2014.”
Meanwhile, the normal life remained crippled in Kashmir Valley for the second consecutive day on Monday in response to separatists” call to protest against “attempts” to abrogate the contentious Article.
However, barring a few late evening incidents of stone-pelting the situation remained peaceful for the entire shutdown period.
The police foiled the protest march of Kashmir Economic Alliance (KEA) and detained its leader Farooq Ahmed Dar along with several traders who tried to march towards the United Nations Military Observer Group in India & Pakistan (UNMOGIP) office.
Carrying banners and chanting slogans, traders assembled at lal Chowk to register their protest against attempts to abrogate the special status. As soon as the protesters tried to march towards UNMOGIP office, police swooped on them and took many traders into temporary custody.
Members of various trade, industries and transport organisations on also held protest demonstrations in old Srinagar and north Kashmir’s Bandipora district headquarters.
All the shops, business establishments, educational institutions and fuel stations were closed while public transport remained off the roads. However, a few private vehicles plied on some roads in Srinagar city. The attendance of employees in government, semi government offices, banks also remained affected due to non-availability of public transport and overall shutdown. Many employees had applied for leave to support the shutdown call as employees’ organisations had declared to support it.
The Joint Resistance leadership (JRl) comprising the triumvirate of Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik had called for two day shutdown on Sunday and Monday.
The authorities put Geelani and Mirwaiz under house arrest while several other leaders and activists were taken into custody. Yasin Malik’s residence was raided but he managed to evade arrest and has been untraceable since Saturday.
Reports said that contingents of police and paramilitary forces have been deployed in strength in all sensitive areas particularly in old city and elsewhere.
Train services between Banihal in Jammu province and Baramulla in north Kashmir were suspended as the shutdown was also observed in many parts of Jammu province.
The ongoing Amarnath Yatra from Jammu Base Camp to the cave shrine in the Kashmir Valley also remained partially suspended for the second day due to shutdown. However, those who are already camped at Baltal and Pahalgam base camps were allowed early morning as per schedule to proceed towards holy cave.
An official spokesman said that on the 40th day of the ongoing Shri Amarnath yatra, 1303 pilgrims paid obeisance at the holy cave. Till date 2,74,118 yatris had the darshan of the Shivaling.
The weekly Karwan-e-Aman bus service operating between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad across loC did not operate for security reasons due to shutdown in Kashmir.
Meanwhile, former Chief Minister and National Conference Vice President Omar Abdullah in a tweet said, “Protecting Article 35A is a tacit acceptance that J&K’s future lies within the Constitution of India otherwise how would it matter if it were struck down or dilutedij”
PDP leader Naeem Akhtar in a tweet said, “Repealing it will be like a marital rape. Converting a constitutional relationship into occupation.”
Akhtar tweeted in response to off-duty senior bureaucrat Dr Shah Faesal, who said that repealing 35 A was akin to snapping the relationship between J&K and the Union of India. In a Facebook post, Faesal on Sunday, who is currently pursuing a fellowship in USA wrote, “History, identity, legality, propriety aside. I would compare Article 35A to a marriage-deed/nikahnama. You repeal it and the relationship is over. Nothing will remain to be discussed afterwards.” Faesal was recently in news when the Department of Personal, Government of India raised objections on his tweets about occurrence of rapes in the country.
The separatist leadership has announced to continue what it called resistance and protest programme against the attempts to tinker with the Article 35 A pertaining to special status of J&K in the Constitution of India.