The High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh has dismissed an application filed by two IAS officers, Pandurang Kondbarao Pole and Shahid Iqbal Choudhary, seeking intervention in a public interest litigation (PIL) to prevent the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) from issuing prosecution sanctions against them in the arms licence scam.
Pole, an AGMUT-cadre IAS officer from the 2004 batch, currently serves as secretary of Land and Building in the NCT of Delhi. Choudhary, another AGMUT-cadre officer from the 2009 batch, is the secretary of the Government of Arunachal Pradesh. They have sought directions from senior advocate Sakal Bhushan to compel the Department of Personnel and Training to consider their representations before acting on the CBI's sanction request.
Bhushan argued that prosecution sanction should be assessed on a case-by-case basis rather than applying a blanket sanction. Therefore, the court should direct the competent authority to consider their representations.
Defence arguments rejected
Rejecting the plea, the division Bench noted that the issuance of such a direction to the respondent authorities was unwarranted. The court declined the application because the senior counsel's submission essentially argued that without a court direction, the respondents would not apply their minds properly, which the court did not find favourable.
When the counsel sought leave to withdraw the application and pursue statutory remedies, the Bench observed that no such liberty was required and dismissed the application as withdrawn.
Following the dismissal, advocate SS Ahmed, representing the PIL petitioners, presented a status report filed by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) pursuant to the court's July 6 order. The MHA report confirmed that after consulting investigating agencies and the Jammu and Kashmir government, it had finalised its opinion and forwarded it to the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) for a final decision. Advocate Ahmed urged the court to direct the DoPT to submit its final decision.
The division bench has directed Deputy Solicitor General of India (DSGI) Vishal Sharma to submit a comprehensive compliance report on all past court orders. The PIL for hearing has been re-notified for December 23.
Case background
The CBI is seeking prosecution sanction against eight IAS officers accused of illegally issuing arms licences for monetary gain while serving as district magistrates between 2012 and 2016. These officers include Pandurang Kondbarao Pole, former DM of Udhampur; M Raju (AGMUT:2005), former DM of Kargil; Yasha Mudgal (AGMUT:2007), former DM of Udhampur and Baramulla; Jitendra Kumar Singh (JH:2008), former DM of Kathua and Rajouri; Dr Shahid Iqbal Choudhary, former DM of Udhampur; Niraj Kumar (AGMUT:2010), former DM of Udhampur and Pulwama; Prasanna Ramaswamy G (AGMUT:2010), former ADM of Kathua and DM of Leh; and Ramesh Kumar (AGMUT:2011), former DM of Kathua.
A CBI report submitted on December 31, 2024, revealed that 1.53 lakh arms licences were issued across 10 districts in the Jammu division and 1.21 lakh across 12 districts in the Kashmir division during the review period.
The MHA has already sanctioned prosecution against another IAS officer, Kumar Rajeev Ranjan, on 31 December 2024. The probe was initially handed over to the CBI after former J&K governor NN Vohra uncovered the illegal licensing network.
The BuckStopper, run by a group of seasoned journalists, holds the powerful accountable. The buck stops with them, as they cannot shrug off their official responsibilities.
