The court said that lacking material documents and grounded in ambiguity, the petition sought to invoke the writ jurisdiction on the basis of incomplete and unsubstantiated facts, clearly unveiling its political undercurrents.

“We cannot lose sight of the fact that the petitioner is President of the Jammu and Kashmir Peoples Democratic Party, a prominent political party in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir but in opposition at present. It appears that the instant petition has been initiated by the petitioner for the explicit purpose of garnering political advantage and positioning herself as a crusader of justice for a particular demographic,” it observed.

The division bench ruled that the PIL could not be allowed to be utilised as an instrument for advancing partisan or political agendas or transforming the court into a political platform.

“PIL is also not a mechanism for gaining political leverage, and the Courts cannot serve as a forum for electoral campaigns. While political parties possess manifold legitimate avenues to engage with the electorate, courts cannot be employed as an instrument for achieving electoral advantage,” the bench stated.

“Notwithstanding the vagueness and ulterior motive that prompted the petitioner to approach the Government and this Court, it is deemed appropriate to observe that under-trials, whose cause the petitioner claims to have projected in this petition, are facing trials before the respective courts. Judicial avenues were/are available to such undertrials for the redressal of any grievance concerning their detention,” it added.

Quoting a Supreme Court judgment, the HC bench said a PIL is maintainable only upon a prima facie showing of public interest. “Where such interest is in doubt or compromised by extraneous considerations, the Court must decline to interfere, as preventing the abuse of legal process is, in itself, a matter of significant public interes,” it observed.