Special Court to try Criminal cases against MPs/ MLAs, 18 States fail to respond

In the petition relating to setting up of special courts to try criminal cases against MPs and MLAs, eighteen States have failed to file details in response to the directions of the Supreme Court..The petition by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay was heard today by the Bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi, Navin Sinha and KM Joseph which asked the Chief Secretaries of the States and Registrar Generals of respective High Courts to file the details by October 12..On August 21, 2018, the Supreme Court had sought the following details from the Union of India..Number of Special Courts set up pursuant to the order of this Court dated December 14, 2017;Whether the courts set up are Courts of Sessions or Magisterial Courts;The territorial jurisdiction of each of these courts.Number of cases pending before each of these Courts, with the break-up of Magisterial and Sessions triable cases;Whether the Union of India intends to set up an additional number of Courts over and above the Courts that may have already been set up pursuant to the order of this Court dated December 14, 2017..Subsequently, the Union government had filed an affidavit pursuant to the orders of the Court..As per the affidavit, 11 States had responded. Out of those, ten States had said that they will set up one Special court each while NCT of Delhi stated that it will set up two such special courts..The Court noted the same and directed the Chief Secretaries of remaining States and Registrar Generals of respective High Courts to furnish the details by October 12..The States have to specifically lay before the court, the precise number of criminal cases pending against MPs and MLAs and which require to be transferred to Special Courts, when the special courts will be functional and whether additional special courts will be required..The case will now be taken up on October 12.