SC to examine validity of Tamil Nadu govt.’s decision to set up special courts for land grabbing cases

The apex court had stayed a HC order transferring such cases to jurisdictional magistrates

The Supreme Court on Tuesday decided to examine the validity of a 2011 decision by the Tamil Nadu Government to set up special courts to exclusively try land grabbing cases.

A Bench of Justices M.R. Shah and B.V. Nagarathna decided to hear the case as part-heard on Wednesday, while perusing past orders of the top court itself, which showed that there were a number of land grabbing cases in the State.

A January 24 order of the court referred to a Madras High Court report that said 1,268 cases and 2,890 FIRs related to land grabbing were pending in total. These include cases either pending before courts to try land grabbing cases or before the jurisdictional magistrate.

At one point, the Bench suggested having the State Advocate General present in the next hearing of the case. One of the top court’s orders said there were 36 special courts in the State to exclusively try land grabbing cases.

The crux of the case before the apex court is the “confusion” regarding whether these special courts can indeed try land grabbing cases exclusively. The Madras High Court had, in a judgment, held that the special courts have no jurisdiction over the cases. The High Court had ordered the cases to be tried by the jurisdictional magistrate.

However, the apex court had stayed the High Court’s decision subsequently. Despite the stay, orders in land grabbing cases vary. In several cases, according to advocates Shree Vignesh and Jose Abraham, appearing for one of the parties before the Supreme Court, the High Court has continued to transfer these cases from the special courts to the jurisdictional magistrates.

“It is very unfortunate that despite this court staying the judgment passed by the High Court, many cases have been transferred from special courts for exclusive trial of land grabbing cases to the jurisdictional courts concerned for taking cognisance in accordance with the law. Once the judgment and order passed by the High Court is stayed, the jurisdiction to try the land grabbing cases continue to lie with the special courts. Therefore, as such, the High Court was wrong in transferring the cases from special courts to the jurisdictional courts,” the Supreme Court had observed in a recent order.