J&K HC dismisses Mehbooba’s PIL on undertrials; says courts cannot serve as forums for electoral campaigns

The Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) High Court on Tuesday dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) of J&K former Chief Minister and People Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti on shifting Kashmiri prisoners from outside jails to the Union Territory, saying it appeared as “driven by political considerations rather than genuine public interest”.

“The petition was lacking material documents and grounded in ambiguity and rested on incomplete, vague and unsubstantiated assertions. The extraordinary jurisdiction of PIL could not be invoked based on generalised claims without naming affected persons, challenging specific orders or placing verifiable material on record,” a Division Bench, comprising Chief Justice Arun Palli and Justice Rajnesh Oswal, observed.

The High Court also underscored that a PIL was meant to advance the cause of marginalised and vulnerable sections who are unable to approach courts themselves and “not as a vehicle for political mobilisation or publicity”.

“PIL cannot be allowed to be utilised as an instrument for advancing partisan or political agendas or transforming the court into a political platform. Courts cannot serve as forums for electoral campaigns or political leverage,” the Bench held.

In October this year, Ms. Mufti moved a PIL before the court on shifting local under-trial prisoners to J&K from all jails outside. The PIL also pleaded that transfers of undertrials outside the U.T. should be allowed only if the authorities demonstrated “unavoidable and compelling necessity”.

The J&K court, however, underlined that the petition stated that “a lot of family members of undertrials” had approached Ms. Mufti, “without disclosing their identities, the number of such prisoners, the nature of cases against them or the specific transfer orders under which they were lodged outside the U.T.”.

Referring to the “violent past” of J&K, the court said special security circumstances often necessitated the transfer of certain undertrials outside the U.T. “Any undertrial aggrieved by detention or transfer to a prison outside J&K can individually approach the competent court to challenge the legality of such an order,” the court added.

The court underlined that there was “existence of a robust legal aid framework under the Legal Services Authorities Act, monitored by the Supreme Court and the High Court”.  

“It further weakened the petitioner’s claim of acting on behalf of voiceless prisoners. The absence of even a single undertrial approaching the court through legal aid channels or otherwise was seen as indicative that those detained outside the U.T. were not genuinely aggrieved, or at least had not chosen to pursue available remedies. In such circumstances, the court held, a political leader could not claim locus standi to espouse their cause through a sweeping PIL,” the court said.

The court further observed that Ms. Mufti was, in effect, a third-party stranger to the alleged grievances and “had failed to establish bona fide public interest”.