Supreme Court refuses to interfere in Centre's Article 370 move, adjourns Kashmir Times plea
New Delhi, Aug 16 (IBNS): Giving more time to the Centre, the Supreme Court on Friday adjourned newspaper Kashmir Times' plea seeking the lifting of clampdown in Jammu and Kashmir and also refused to entertain a petition seeking quashing of the Centre's move to abrogate Article 370.
Hearing the petition filed by Kashmir Times, which claims it is unable to operate in Srinagar, the top court preferred to wait for the Centre to lift the curfew presently imposed in large parts of Jammu and Kashmir, which has lost its special status after the Narendra Modi government scrapped Article 370 more than a week ago.
Kashmir Times Executive Editor Anuradha Bhasin said, "I can print my papers from Jammu but not from Srinagar...I am not in touch with a single bureau member of several districts. There is no communication link and a virtual clampdown in Kashmir."
After the top court judgement, Bhasin's lawyer Vrinda Grover told media, "Media is not being able to operate properly. They can't write, report, print and publish. There is a sweeping restriction in the Kashmir valley.
The CJI has said he will give some time to the Centre as the landlines and broadband will be restored by this week. So we will wait for couple of days. If the restrictions are lifted within these two days, then some of our purposes will be solved."
However, Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi came down hard upon ML Sharma who had sought quashing of the historic step of dilution of Article 370 taken by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government.
Calling Sharma's all petitions as "defective", the CJI has asked the petitioner to amend them.
Earlier hearing a petition seeking an immediate lifting of the clampdown from Jammu and Kashmir, the Supreme Court on Tuesday said it would give the Centre a little more time as the situation in Jammu and Kashmir is sensitive.
Meanwhile, several police inputs claim the situation in Jammu and Kashmir is largely peaceful and the central government is likely to lift some of the restrictions by Friday evening.
Apart from abrogating Article 370, the Modi government has also scrapped Article 35A which was used to define "permanent residents" of Jammu and Kashmir barring non-residents to buy immovable assets in the valley.
Also the Centre has bifurcated Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories- Jammu and Kashmir with an assembly and Ladakh without an assembly.
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