The Maharashtra government has formed a committee in each district to monitor and fast-track criminal cases against members of parliament (MP), members of legislative assembly and members of legislative council.
The principal district judge will be the chairperson of the committee, followed by the district magistrate who will be a member and the district public prosecutor who will be the member secretary. The committee will create and update the list of all such cases pending trial.
In case there is a trial pending for more than one year, the chairperson shall send a report to the chief justice of the respective high court explaining reasons behind the delay. A copy of the same shall be send to the secretary of home affairs (special).
The state recently issued a government resolution (GR) following a direction from the ministry of home affairs. The direction was based on the recent Supreme Court judgement which directed that in relation to sitting MPs and MLAs who have charges framed against them for the offences which are specified in Section 8(1), 8(2) and 8(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, the trial shall be concluded as speedily and expeditiously as possible and in no case later than one year from the date of the framing of charge(s).
Further, the court had said, "In such cases, as far as possible, the trial shall be conducted on day-to-day basis. If, for some extraordinary circumstances, the concerned court is not being able to conclude the trial within one year from the date of framing of charge(s), such court would submit the report to the chief justice of the respective high court indicating special reasons for not adhering to the above time limit and delay in conclusion of the trial. In such a situation, the chief justice may issue appropriate directions to the concerned court extending the time for conclusion of the trial."
The GR also constituted a review committee under the chairmanship of additional chief secretary (home) to review the cases at regular intervals.
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