SC pulls up Centre over setting up of special courts to try politicians, asks for response by Sep 5

New Delhi, Aug 30: Hearing the case pertaining to setting up of special courts to exclusively deal with cases involving politicians, the Supreme Court on Thursday pulled up the Central Government for not furnishing the details before it of MLAs and MPs who have criminal records against them.

The apex court has asked the Union Government to file its detailed response in the case by September 5.

In December 2017, a bench headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi had directed the Centre to set up 12 special courts, which were asked to take up day-to-day trial of cases involving politicians from March 1 this year.

On August 21, the Supreme Court had asked the Centre to inform it about how many special courts have been set up to exclusively deal with cases involving politicians after its order last year. A bench headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi had asked the Centre to inform the court whether these special courts were courts of sessions or magisterial courts and also provide details of their territorial jurisdiction.

The bench had then asked the government to inform it about the number of cases pending before each of these special courts, along with the break-up of magisterial and sessions triable cases there. It also asked the government whether it intended to set up additional special courts over and above the courts already set up.

The bench last week said these details should be placed before it and posted the matter for further hearing on August 28.

Earlier, the apex court had set a deadline of one year for lower courts to complete trial in criminal cases involving sitting MPs and MLAs. It had also said that all such proceedings involving lawmakers must be conducted on a day-to-day basis.