New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to hear a plea to prevent a planned mahapanchayat from taking place on 15 June in Uttarakhand’s Purola town.
The event is being organised by the right-wing group Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyaan.
In two separate petitions filed Tuesday, Hindi scholars Ashok Vajpeyi and Apoorvanand and the Peoples Union for Civil Liberties asked the Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud and Uttarakhand High Court Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi to prevent the mahapanchayat because “it could lead to communal tensions and large-scale violence”.
A vacation bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Ahsanuddin Amanullah told the petitioners’ lawyer Shahrukh Alam to approach the Uttarakhand High Court instead.
Justice Nath said: “Law and order is for the administration to handle. You move the high court. Why do you come here?”
Why do you express distrust in approaching HC? If there is a mandamus by this Court, High Court will pass orders. You should have some trust in the high court. Why can’t you trust the administration?” Justice Amanullah asked.
Alam told the justices that the petitioners had approached the Supreme Court in view of the earlier mandamus issued by it to the Uttarakhand government in a hate speech matter. A mandamus is a judicial writ issued as a command to a lower court or a governing body to perform its public duty.
On Tuesday, 52 former civil servants wrote to Uttarakhand’s chief secretary and police chief expressing deep concern about recent communal and anti-Muslim programmes in the state.
Their letter said, “It is a mystery to us as to why, despite information being available in the public domain, the criminal campaign against minority communities underway since 26 May 2023 has seen no action whatsoever being taken by the administration beyond the registration of a case against ‘unknown persons’ after posters were put up.”
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