INDIA COURT SET TO DELIVER VERDICT

Punjab & Haryana High Court judge Ashutosh Mohantta, inaugurated the first evening court in the city today. Speaking on the occasion, he said about 120,000 cases were pending in the district courts. “The evening court will prove to be quite useful for litigants and help in reducing the number of such cases”, he observed.

He said initially the high court has decided to only put up traffic, Shop Act and Factories Act ‘challan’ (fine) cases before the evening court, as agreed by the lawyers. “In the future other categories of cases may be put up before this court, but that would be only with the concurrence of the District Bar Association”, he added.

Sessions judge SP Bangarh said 8,863 ‘challan’ cases have been entrusted to the evening court for disposal. The timings of the court will be from 4:30 pm to 5:30 pm and judicial magistrate Amit Thind would head it, he added.

Senior division civil judge JPS Wehniwal stated there were over 32,000 cheque bounce cases pending in the district courts. “Those cases can also be put up before the evening court, if the legal fraternity agrees”, he added.

Earlier, District Bar Association president Naval Kishore Chhibber, Khanna Bar Association president Shamsher Singh Gill, Jagraon Bar Association president JS Sehgal, deputy commissioner Vikas Garg, police commissioner Ishwar Singh, Khanna SSP Sukhminder Singh Mann as well as former DBA presidents Parupkar Singh Ghumman and KR Sikri extended a warm welcome to justice Mohantta. A Punjab police contingent also presented a guard of honour to him.

Among others present on this occasion were additional sessions judges JS Chouhan, Kishore Kumar, AS Grewal, Munish Singal,Manjinder Singh, Mohammad Gulzar and Ashok Kumar, fast track court judges BR Garg, AS Narula and Harveen Bhardwaj, chief judicial magistrate Jatinder Kaur and Jagraon subdivisional judicial magistrate Mandeep Bedi.

Meanwhile, a deputation comprising Jagraon Bar Association president Sehgal, secretary Vishal Sharma, and former presidents Ashwani Attray, RS Chahal and Baldev Krishan Goyal urged Mohantta to ensure speedy completion of ongoing construction work at the judicial complex in Jagraon.