J

Srinagar, Jun 11 (UNI) Taking a very serious note of irregularities found in the proceedings of some criminal cases heared by a magistrate in Kupwara, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court has ordered that no such case should be referred to the magistrate.

A single bench of the High Court, comprising Justice B A Kirmani, directed the district magistrate, Kupwara, to withdraw all pending criminal cases from his office with immediate effect.

To prevent any further abuse of office by the Magistrate, who appears to be the Assistant Commissioner, Kupwara, Justice Kirmani said all pending cases may be assigned to other officials suitable for further proceeding.

Directing the state chief secretary to take notice of the High Court observations, he ordered to the district Magistrate that in future no criminal proceedings were assigned to the magistrate.

Justice Kirmani said that during the verification of the records of different cases pending in the courts in Kupwara, several irregularities were noticed.

He said various files of Executive Magistrate and Assistant Commissioner, Kupwara, were retained for observation. The files were held to assess the legality of orders passed.

Keeping in view the irregularities, the court had assigned the files under observation to Session Judge, Kupwara, for thorough examinations. The Session Judge had also been directed to pass appropriate orders after hearing all parties and verifying the records.

UNI BAS YSS SW UCS1344