SC will transfer Kathua trial out of J&K on 'slightest' sign of unfairness
New Delhi, April 26 : The Supreme Court on Thursday said it will shift the Kathua gang-rape and murder trial out of Jammu and Kashmir at the "slightest possibility of lack of a fair trial".
A bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justice A.M. Khanwilkar and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud said its "real concern" was to see that a fair trial was conducted.
The trial should be fair for the victim's family and for the accused, the bench added.
At the outset, the Bar Council of India (BCI) Committee filed in a sealed cover a report before the apex court and supported the demand of the High Court Bar Association at Jammu and Kathua District Court Bar Association for a CBI probe into the case.
The BCI also said the bar associations had neither obstructed the Crime Branch from filing the charge-sheet in the case nor the advocate representing the victim's family.
However, senior advocate P.V. Dinesh, who had brought to the notice of apex court the alleged obstruction by lawyers, objected to the BCI panel's submissions, saying it was only tasked with the job of finding out whether the local lawyers had obstructed the trial proceedings and instead the panel seemed to have formed opinions on the investigation by the state Crime Branch.
But the apex court said its primary concern at this point is to provide fair trial in the case and did not want to divert its attention from this aspect.
"Let the main issue be not missed. Fair investigation, fair trial, appropriate legal guidance and representation of both the accused and the victim's family has to be there," the bench said.
"Let us not get into what the Bar Council of India says... If we do, the victim goes away from our attention. Let us not digress from the real issue. The real issue is that how can we achieve justice," it added.
"Our first concern and our constitutional concern is to ensure fair trial and procedure to provide protection to the victim's lawyer so there is no obstruction to justice and finally to transfer the case, if found necessary," the bench observed.
Considering the issues of lawyers' alleged obstruction, the apex court said if the lawyers are at fault, they would be dealt in accordance with the law, and posted the matter for July 30.
Senior advocate Indira Jaising, appearing for the victim's father, urged the court to monitor the trial. The bench said it could examine the prospect of fast-tracking the trial and oversee the progress of the trial.
On April 13, the apex court took suo motu notice of an incident of lawyers of Jammu and Kathua bar associations preventing the victim's lawyer from appearing in the case.
In January, an eight-year-old girl went missing while grazing horses in Rasana forest in Jammu and Kashmir's Kathua district. Her body was recovered a week later.
The apex court agreed to hear a plea of two of the accused in the case, Sanji Ram and Vishal Jangotra, seeking transfer of the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) besides seeking to be impleaded as parties in the petition filed by the father of the victim for transfer of case from Jammu and Kashmir to Chandigarh.
The victim father's plea for transfer of case would be heard on April 27 by the apex court.
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Israel says rabbi who went missing in UAE was killed
Tel Aviv, Nov 24: Israel said Sunday that the body of an Israeli-Moldovan rabbi who went missing in the United Arab Emirates has been found after he was killed in what it described as a “heinous antisemitic terror incident.”
The statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said Israel “will act with all means to seek justice with the criminals responsible for his death.” There was no immediate comment from the UAE.
Zvi Kogan, 28, an ultra-Orthodox rabbi who went missing on Thursday, ran a Kosher grocery store in the futuristic city of Dubai, where Israelis have flocked for commerce and tourism since the two countries forged diplomatic ties in the 2020 Abraham Accords.
The agreement has held through more than a year of soaring regional tensions unleashed by Hamas' October 7, 2023 attack into southern Israel. But Israel's devastating retaliatory offensive in Gaza and its invasion of Lebanon, after months of fighting with the Hezbollah group, have stoked anger among Emiratis, Arab nationals and others living in the the UAE.
Iran, which supports Hamas and Hezbollah, has also been threatening to retaliate against Israel after a wave of airstrikes Israel carried out in October in response to an Iranian ballistic missile attack.
The Emirati government did not respond to a request for comment.
Early Sunday, the UAE's state-run WAM news agency acknowledged Kogan's disappearance but pointedly did not acknowledge he held Israeli citizenship, referring to him only as being Moldovan. The Emirati Interior Ministry described Kogan as being “missing and out of contact.”
“Specialised authorities immediately began search and investigation operations upon receiving the report,” the Interior Ministry said.
Netanyahu told a regular Cabinet meeting later Sunday that he was “deeply shocked” by Kogan's disappearance and death. He said he appreciated the cooperation of the UAE in the investigation and said that ties between the two countries would continue to be strengthened.
Israel's largely ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog, condemned the killing and thanked Emirati authorities for "their swift action." He said he trusts they “will work tirelessly to bring the perpetrators to justice.”
Kogan was an emissary of the Chabad Lubavitch movement, a prominent and highly observant branch of ultra-Orthodox Judaism based in Brooklyn's Crown Heights neighborhood in New York City. It said he was last seen in Dubai. The UAE has a burgeoning Jewish community, with synagogues and businesses catering to kosher diners.
The Rimon Market, a Kosher grocery store that Kogan managed on Dubai's busy Al Wasl Road, was shut Sunday. As the wars have roiled the region, the store has been the target of online protests by supporters of the Palestinians. Mezuzahs on the front and the back doors of the market appeared to have been ripped off when an Associated Press journalist stopped by on Sunday.
Kogan's wife, Rivky, is a US citizen who lived with him in the UAE. She is the niece of Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, who was killed in the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
The UAE is an autocratic federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula and is also home to Abu Dhabi. Local Jewish officials in the UAE declined to comment.
While the Israeli statement did not mention Iran, Iranian intelligence services have carried out past kidnappings in the UAE.
Western officials believe Iran runs intelligence operations in the UAE and keeps tabs on the hundreds of thousands of Iranians living across the country.
Iran is suspected of kidnapping and later killing British Iranian national Abbas Yazdi in Dubai in 2013, though Tehran has denied involvement. Iran also kidnapped Iranian German national Jamshid Sharmahd in 2020 from Dubai, taking him back to Tehran, where he was executed in October.
