SC Declines to Hear Plea Challenging J&K LG's Authority to Nominate 5 Assembly Members, Suggests HC

"Go to the high court", a bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna told senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who appeared on behalf of the petitioner.

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain a petition challenging the Jammu and Kashmir Lt Governor's power to nominate five members to the Assembly based on a request from the Union Ministry of Home Affairs.

"Go to the high court", a bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna told senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who appeared on behalf of the petitioner.

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We are not inclined to entertain the present petition filed under Article 32 of the Constitution of India and grant liberty to the petitioner to approach the jurisdictional high court by way of a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India", ordered the Bench while comprising Justice Sanjay Kumar, clarifying that it has not "exposed any opinion on merits".

All the five nominated members will be having the voting rights while forming the Government, decided by the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act 2019 and also by Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Amendment Act 2013.

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Out of the five nominated members, two should be women, two from the Kashmiri Pandit displaced community with at least one woman, and one from the West Pakistan refugees.

The National Conference's Vice President, Omar Abdullah, met Lt Governor Manoj Sinha on Friday at the Raj Bhavan in Srinagar and staked claim to form the government.

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The NC has 42 members in the 90-member Assembly, while its allies Congress and CPI-M comprise six and one, respectively. The BJP has 29, the PDP three, the AAP and the Peoples Conference one each, and there are seven Independents.

While 7 Independent candidates emerged victorious in the Assembly election, most of them, including Pyare Lal Sharma, Satish Sharma, Mohammad Choudhary Akram, Dr Rameshwar Singh and Muzaffar Iqbal Khan, have decided to extend support to the NC. The Aam Aadmi Party's lone winner, Mehraj Malik has also said it would support the NC.

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Abdullah has said that the first business of the J&K cabinet would be to pass a resolution for the restoration of statehood. "It should be the first business of the cabinet to pass a resolution asking the Centre to restore statehood to J&K. The Chief Minister should then travel to Delhi with the resolution and ask the government to restore our statehood," he said.

Omar Abdullah admitted that some apprehensions exist about the restrictive powers of the government in a Union Territory setup.

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