NGO files curative petition in SC seeking probe into Kashmiri Pandits killing, exodus
Mar 24, 2022
New Delhi [India], March 24 : A Kashmiri Pandit based NGO, on Thursday filed a curative petition in the Supreme Court seeking a probe into the killing of Kashmiri Pandits in the Valley in 1989-90, during the height of militancy.
The curative petition by the NGO, Roots in Kashmir has been filed against a 2017 order of the top court, which had dismissed the organisation's petition for probe citing a long delay.
On July 24, 2017, the Supreme Court had dismissed the plea filed by the NGO saying it is difficult to have any probe and collect evidence on the issue more than 27 years after the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits. On October 25, 2017, the top court had dismissed the review petition.
The curative petition sought direction to decide the case afresh on merit by way of providing hearing opportunities to the parties.
It cited the example of the 1984 Anti-Sikh riots case where the court had taken cognizance even after a lapse of more than 33 years. The Delhi High Court re-opened five cases related to anti-Sikh riots in a judgment of the year 1986, it added.
The curative petition further mentioned that the apex court allowed the appeal of CBI and transferred the criminal case from a Court in Raibarali to the Special Court in Lucknow with regard to the matter pertaining to the demolition of Babri Masjid and also allowed framing of charges of criminal conspiracy relating to the year 1992.
"Judgment and order are liable to be reviewed on the ground that the order as it appears is based on the absolutely unsubstantiated presumption that no evidence is likely to be available after the passage of time ignoring the fact that trials are also proceeding in the some of the FIRs since the year 1996," the curative petition stated.
The curative petition also said that the apex court "completely failed to appreciate that more than 700 Kashmiri Pandits were murdered during 1989 to 1998 and FIRs were lodged in more than 200 cases, but not even a single FIR has reached to the stage of filing of Charge sheet or conviction."
A curative petition is the last judicial resort available for redressal of grievances.
Kashmiri Pandits were forced to flee the Valley in the early 1990s amid rising threats and attacks during the peak of militancy.
The petition filed in 2017 by the NGO had sought that separatists like Yasin Malik and Bitta Karate, named in the FIRs, be investigated and tried for the murders, which they said were never solved.
