STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: Prof Bhim Singh, Senior Advocate in the Supreme Court of India and Executive Chairman of State Legal Aid Committee has asked Dr Farooq Abdullah, former Chief Minister of J&K to express immediate apology before the Supreme Court of India for the contempt of the Supreme Court which he has committed by challenging the authority of the Apex Court with regard to writ petition pending before the Supreme Court of India challenging the Constitutionality of Article 35(A).
Article 35(A) is not the creation of the Parliament of India nor this Article is constituent of temporary Article 370 dealing with the special powers vested in the Legislature of J&K.
Bhim said that Farooq falsely claimed that he had held an All-Party Meeting in Srinagar in which he has challenged the authority of the Supreme Court of India to hear a writ petition filed by an NGO challenging the validity of Article 35(A).
Bhim said that Article 35 is the concluding Article in the Chapter-III of the Constitution of India dealing with the Fundamental Rights enshrined in that Article for all the citizens of India. He said that Article 35 was amended by a Presidential Order in 1954 without the authority of law.
“The President of India was vested power to interfere within the scope of the power vested in him by the Constituent Assembly of India. The President of India could interfere by himself without the advice of the council of ministers and he has no power vested in him beyond the limits and scope of Article 370,” he added.
Bhim said that the Presidential Order of May 14, 1954 adding ‘A’ to Article 35 was totally absurd, illegal, unconstitutional hence void.
“This is unfortunate that no notice was taken by the Supreme Court of India which has the authority and power to interpret any provision in the Constitution of India,” Bhim said, adding that 35(A) has not been published even by the government in the books of the Indian Constitution. He said this 35(A) rarely appears somewhere and sometime.
Bhim said that the Supreme Court is competent to take notice of this serious legal issue suo-moto. He described the meeting of the frustrated and outdated politicians in Kashmir who have been rejected by the people of Kashmir itself as highly objectionable, which amounts to the contempt of the Supreme Court as it has challenged the authority of the Supreme Court from a political platform.
Bhim hoped that the Supreme Court which is hearing the matter relating to the validity of Article 35(A) to issue ‘contempt of court notice’ to Dr. Farooq Abdullah and other political leaders which held a meeting against the hearing of writ petition filed by an NGO before the Supreme Court. He said that Farooq and some other frustrated leaders from the Valley have claimed the support of all opposition parties in J and K which is totally absurd and misleading.
“This amounts to contempt of the Supreme Court as Dr. Farooq Abdullah and some other political leaders from Kashmir Valley have threatened the authority of the Apex Court of the country hearing a writ petition on the validity of Article 35(A),” he added.