High Court grants last chance to Punjab and Haryana govts to file status reports regarding pending criminal cases against MPs/MLAs

The Punjab and Haryana High Court in the case Court On Its Own Motion v. State Of Punjab And Others observed and has granted the last opportunity to the State Governments in Punjab and Haryana to file status reports regarding pending criminal cases against MP/MLAs.

The bench comprising of Justice Augustine George Masih and the Justice Alok Jain observed and gave a week’s time to the two governments and warned them of imposing costs if reports aren’t filed within the stipulated time.

The court remarked that this is fit case where heavy cost should be imposed upon the respondents but keeping in view the fact that last opportunity has been prayed for, we adjourn the case for 29.09.2022. Thus, the needful be now done within a period of one week. It is made clear that if the status/affidavit report is not filed within the time stipulated, heavy cost would be imposed upon the official responsible to file the affidavit/status report to be recovered from her/his salary.

However, the direction has been made by the Division Bench in the suo moto case for expeditious disposal of criminal cases against legislators in terms of directions passed by the Supreme Court in Ashwani Kumar Upadhyay v. Union of India & Anr. It was observed that among other things, the Supreme Court had, in its order directed that if the court hearing cases against MPs and MLAs grants a stay, it should not normally be unconditional or of indefinite duration.

Also, the court had directed thus in the event that a stay is considered necessary, the Court should hear the matter on a day-to-day basis and dispose of the same expeditiously, without any unnecessary adjournment, preferably within a period of two months. Further, a status report has been filed by the Inspector General of Police, U.T. Chandigarh on September 7, which was taken on record by the High Court.

The court noted that earlier this year, perusing the status report filed by the States of Punjab and Haryana regarding the probe into the criminal cases against the Lawmakers (MPs/MLAs), the Punjab and Haryana High Court had observed that the intention to probe cases on the part of the states is present, therefore, their actions in this regard are lagging.

The bench of Justice Augustine George Masih and Justice Sandeep Moudgil observed that we would say that the intention on the part of the State of Punjab or Haryana is lacking but the actions and the efforts supporting the said intention appear to be missing or at least lagging.

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