Darjeeling, March 19: The Darjeeling Bar Association here has called a two-day “cease-work” in the district court from tomorrow to press for the relocation of the special CBI court to the hill town.
This means, no advocate, except for government lawyers, will appear in court.
Seshmani Gurung, the vice-president of the association, today said: “Since we have not heard a word from the state government on the relocation of the special CBI court to Darjeeling, we have decided to go on ceasework for two days in the Darjeeling courts from tomorrow.”
The association had asked the state government to respond to its demand by today.
“The cease-work means no lawyer will appear in court. But government lawyers will be working. For persons booked under bailable offences, the judges will grant them bail. But there will be no one to oppose non-bailable charges slapped on arrested persons,” Gurung said.
“We will send a four-member delegation to meet the state government officials on Thursday,” he added.
The state government had on Saturday cancelled the inauguration of the CBI special court in Siliguri, allegedly after protests from Darjeeling lawyers who said the plains town was being given more prominence than the district headquarters. The programme was cancelled despite invitations being sent by the secretary of the state’s judicial department and the district and sessions judge.
The CBI court, which was previously on the Darjeeling court premises, had been relocated to Calcutta apparently because of lack of CBI cases.
“But there are at least 41 CBI cases from the hills and the relocation of the court is causing great inconvenience to the Darjeeling people,” Gurung had said earlier.
The association had gone on a four-day pendown strike from February 1 with the same demand.(Telegraph)
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