Ex-CIC to SC: Police blocks roads, not Shaheen dadis
SC negotiator says roads far away from anti-CAA agitation site barricaded
Former Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah told the Supreme Court that the protest at Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) was peaceful and inconvenience being caused to commuters was due to barricades “unnecessarily” put by police on roads far away from the site.
The same stand has been taken by social activist Syed Bahadur Abbas Naqvi and Bhim Army chief Chandra Shekhar Azad in their joint affidavit filed in the apex court. Habibullah, Mr Azad and Mr Naqvi have jointly filed an intervention application in the top court which is seized of the matter.
Habibullah had visited the protest site at Shaheen Bagh pursuant to the direction by a bench of Justice S.K. Kaul and Justice K.M. Joseph. The bench is scheduled to hear the matter on Monday. The top court is hearing pleas seeking removal of protestors from Shaheen Bagh and ensuring smooth traffic flow in the area.
The Supreme Court had earlier said that though people have a fundamental right to protest “peacefully and lawfully”, it was troubled by the blocking of a public road at Shaheen Bagh as it might lead to a "chaotic situation".
Habbibullah said: “I noticed that there are numerous number of roads that have no connection with the protest that have been barricaded by the police unnecessarily, abdicating their responsibilities and duties and wrongly laying the blame on the protest. It is this barricading of unconnected roads that has led to a chaotic situation.” Former CIC Habbibullah also said the police should reveal the names of persons responsible for the decision to block the parallel and arterial roads in the area. The blockage of the road by protesters had become a key issue ahead of the Delhi Assembly elections, with the BJP blaming the protesters and accusing Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal of encouraging them. “Feeding biryani to Shaheen Bagh” was how the BJP’s star campaigner and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had put it. Habibullah said the protesters were not blocking school vans or ambulances as has been alleged by parties.
“I was informed that all ambulances and school vans that clear the police barricade after being found to be genuine by the police, are given immediate safe passage through the protest site,” he said in the affidavit.
Along with Habibullah, the court has also appointed senior advocates Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran as mediators. In his affidavit, Habibullah has contended that “Shaheen Bagh stands tall as a firm example of peaceful dignified dissent, more so in the face of various instances of state-sponsored violence on similar dissents across India. “We have been sad and mute witnesses to police brutality and negative typecasting of a particular community across the country. Crushing dissent instead of entering into a dialogue is the new norm, but it is alien to our Constitution,” he has claimed.
In their joint affidavit, Mr Naqvi and Mr Azad have alleged that "the present ruling dispensation, at the behest of its political masters, had devised a strategy of extinguishing these pro-tests by falsely attributing violence and acts of vandalism to peaceful protestors".
They have also said that police has “unnecessarily” barricaded numerous roads that “have no connection with the protest" and are at a great distance from the site, thereby, “abdicating their responsibilities and duties and wrongly laying the blame on the protest”.
“It is these barricading of unconnected roads that has led to a chaotic situation,” Habibullah claimed.
THE SUPREME COURT had earlier said that though people have a fundamental right to protest “peacefully and lawfully”, it was troubled by the blocking of a public road at Shaheen Bagh