R.K. Agrawal JUDGMENT
A.K. Sikri, J.
1. In the present writ petition filed by the Petitioners Under Article 32 of the Constitution of India, the Petitioners who are migrants of the State of Jammu & Kashmir (hereinafter referred to as the 'migrants') state that they had planned to take out a peaceful protest march upto Delhi for ventilating their grievances. However, when they reached near Katra in Jammu & Kashmir, the Respondent authorities through their police personnel had beaten up and manhandled these migrants in a most brutal and barbaric manner on 07.08.2007. It is the allegation of the Petitioners that this incident has violated their rights guaranteed to them under Articles 14, 19, 21 and 22 of the Constitution of India and prayers are made in the petition for taking criminal action against the erring officials, including Respondent Nos. 3 to 9, and also to pay compensation to each of the Petitioners and other Jammu migrants who suffered serious injuries, in the sum of Rs. 10 lakhs. Prayer is also made to order the special investigation into the said episode of 07.08.2007.
2. Giving detail background of the grievances of the migrants leading to the said incident, it is mentioned that Ms. Anita Thakur, Petitioner No. 1, is a General Secretary of the Jammu & Kashmir Panthers Party whereas Petitioner No. 2 is an Advocate and also the Secretary of the said Party, who have been espousing the cause of the Jammu migrants (about 2200 families) who were forced to leave their homes between 1996-1999 in view of the terrorist attacks on these families. Third Petitioner is a senior Journalist who was also assaulted and arrested on 07.08.2007 for giving media coverage of the incident in question.
According to the Petitioners, these migrants are living in most miserable conditions and it became difficult for them to survive. Out of these 2200 migrant families, about 950 families have been residing in broken huts of Talwara camp. For redressal of their grievances, a writ petition in the nature of PIL (PIL No. 534/1999) was filed in the High Court of Jammu & Kashmir wherein order dated 06.09.2002 was passed by the High Court directing that persons from Poonch, Rajouri, Doda, Udhampur and Jammu provinces, who had suffered and been forced to migrate on account of militancy would be entitled to the same treatment as migrants from the Kashmir Valley. This order was challenged by the State of Jammu & Kashmir by filing SLP (C) No. 34/2003 in this Court. In that SLP, the order dated 12.07.2006 was passed to the following effect:
Pursuant to our direction, the Relief Commissioner (Migrants) filed an affidavit on 03.12.2004 and in the affidavit the details are given regarding the relief measures given to the Kashmir migrants and it is stated that the relief is being provided to various migrants who are Kashmiri migrants and to migrants other than Kashmiri migrants. In view of the averments stated in the affidavit, we do not find any necessity to give further directions. However, counsel for the Respondents stated that some of the migrants are not being regularly paid the relief measures and since March 2004 they are........