Jammu and Kashmir High Court says state government should review obsolete laws

SRINAGAR: The Jammu & Kashmir High Court has disposed two petitions seeking enforcement and scrapping of the beef ban law, respectively, but observed that many monarchical laws have become obsolete and even offence to the Constitution.

The court put the onus back on the state government, directing it to take further action in accordance with the court's observations and review the existing laws to ensure no inter-religious conflict takes place among the people of the state. The court said laws which had been created to serve an autocratic monarch have become redundant, obsolete or even offensive after Constitution came into force. The J&K government, the court said, has to consider reviewing of existing laws and take policy decision within the framework of the Constitution.

"Remaining of such laws or provisions thereof on the statute book would be inconsequential… Some laws or provisions of laws, with the passage of time, lose their sheen and are dead laws rendered incapable of enforcement," the court said in its order.

The full bench of the J&K High Court, constituted on directions of apex court, comprising Justices Muzaffar Hussain Attar, Ali Muhammad Magray and Tashi Rabstan issued the order. "When forces of destruction and divisiveness are at work, then forces of legislation and cohesiveness have to take charge and provide acceptable legal and constitutional solutions," the court said. Earlier, the two wings of the High Court in the state had issued "conflicting orders", one directing the police to enforce the beef ban while the other asked the government to respond to a different public interest litigation seeking to scrap the archaic beef ban law. "Both the petitions are disposed of alongside with connected MPs and orders passed from time to time," the court said.

The court rejected the first PIL for not being in public interest and the second for being a reaction to the first PIL. As per the law passed in the state with amendments in 1932, under section 298A of the Ranbir Penal Code, intentionally killing or slaughtering a cow or like animal is a cognisable non-bailable offence punishable with ten years of imprisonment and fine.