Maloy Ghatak at the circuit house in Jalpaiguri on Tuesday. (Biplab Basak)

Siliguri, Aug. 7: State law minister Malay Ghatak today said the Siliguri court complex on Kutcheri Road would be moved to a five-acre near Darjeeling More to ease congestion on the premises.

Ghatak, who reached here this morning, visited several sites in and around Siliguri with cabinet colleague, the north Bengal development minister Gautam Deb.

“We visited some sites across Siliguri to find a suitable location for setting up the court here. The court complex is crowded and causes inconvenience to litigants, lawyers, judges and other officials everyday,” Ghatak said.

“After visiting all the sites, we have finalised a five-acre plot located within the Himul Cattle Feed unit. A sum of Rs 14 crore has already been sanctioned by the state government for the construction of the new court building.”

According to sources, the district magistrate of Darjeeling has been instructed to carry out the transfer of land to the state law ministry within a fortnight.

The complex has 11 courts —the additional chief judicial magistrate’s court, two session courts, two judicial magistrate courts, three fast track courts, two civil courts and one consumer court.

Only the CBI court is located at Deshbandhupara and is not a part of the complex.

“Now that the police commissionerate has been formed, at least two courts, one of metropolitan magistrate and another of the chief metropolitan magistrate, would be set up in Siliguri. These are likely to be built at the same new site where the other courts have been planned,” a court source said.

After finalising the site, both ministers headed to Jalpaiguri, where they held a meeting with officials of district administration to inquire about the status of the temporary infrastructure and the permanent infrastructure of the Calcutta High Court circuit bench.

The temporary infrastructure of the circuit bench is ready at the zilla parishad dak bungalow located on Station Road. The construction of the boundary wall is in progress on a 40-acre plot at the SJDA Complex in Rajbaripara of Jalpaiguri.