SC blocks further probe against army major by J&K Police

Lt. Col. Karamveer Singh — a serving army officer and father of Major Aditya Kumar — is seeking the quashing of the FIR against his son. At the outset of the hearing, Attorney General K.K. Venugopal told the court that the mere filing of the complaint against an army personnel serving in the disturbed area was barred under Section 7 of Armed Forces Special Powers Act without the prior sanction of the Centre. Attorney General cited top court judgements of 2006 and 2014 in support of his contention that without Centre’s sanction even a complaint against a serving army officer operating in disturbed area was prohibited under the law.

However, this was opposed by senior counsel Shekhar phade, who is appearing for Jammu and Kashmir, saying that the registration of FIR and even filing of chargesheet did not amount to taking cognizance of the offence and thus no prior permission of the Centre was required. Attorney General Venugopal took exception to phade telling the court that Section 7 of the Armed Forces Disturbed Area Act could be read as a licence to kill people.

Lt. Col. Karamveer Singh is father of Major Aditya Kumar. The petitioner father has contended that registration of FIR and the consequent proceedings would adversely impact the morale of the armed forces fighting militancy in the trouble-torn states. Major Kumar and other soldiers of 10 Garhwal Rifles have been accused of opening fire on a stone-pelting mob which had attacked an army convoy near Ganowpora village in Shopian district on January 27. The firing resulted in the death of three in the stone pelting crowd. It said that Major Kumar was wrongly and arbitrarily med as the incident relates to an Army convoy on bofide military duty in an area under the AFSPA (Armed Forces Special Powers Acts), which was isolated by an “unruly and deranged” stone-pelting mob. The intention of the Major Kumar was to save Army personnel and property, and the fire was inflicted only to impair and provide a safe escape. (IANS)