Court notice to state on plea challenging assembly resolution

CHANDIGARH: THE Punjab and Haryana high court on Wednesday issued notice to Punjab government on a plea challenging the resolution passed in the state assembly in August for taking back probe into post-sacrilege violence in 2015 from the CBI.

The matter will be taken up again on Friday when Punjab government submits its response on the plea by Shamsher Singh, a head constable and gunman of former Moga SSP Charanjit Singh Sharma. The CBI, too, has been asked to respond by Friday.

During the hearing, Punjab government assured the court that it will submit a status report on probe and that no final report will be filed before any court without prior permission of the high court.

The court was told that the August 28 resolution was unsustainable as no reasons have been assigned therein for reviewing the decision taken earlier to hand over the investigation to the CBI.

The petitioner had told the court that legislative entities are not immune from judicial review. “The validity of the action of the legislature is subject to judicial review if it trespasses on the fundamental rights conferred on the citizens,” the court was told.

The petitioner has demanded that the probe be handed over to the CBI. The state government has since constituted a five-member special investigation team (SIT), headed by Prabodh Kumar, director, Bureau of Investigations (BOI), to probe sacrilege and police firing incidents.

Earlier, on October 23, Charanjit Singh Sharma and three other police officers, named in these FIRS, had approached the court for a CBI probe into the four FIRS registered in connection with the violence after the 2015 incidents of sacrilege. Two persons had died in the violence.