Postpone rally, court suggests Kodandaram

The Hyderabad High Court on Monday asked the TJAC to decide and inform the court on Tuesday if it was amenable to suggestions to postpone the proposed ‘unemployment rally’ from February 22 to Sunday, February 26, and also to shift the venue.

Justice A. Ramalingeswara Rao was hearing a petition by Telangana Vidhyavantula Vedika, one of the wings of the TJAC, represented by Prof. M. Kodandaram, seeking permission for the rally in the city.

The judge asked B. Rachana Reddy, counsel for the petitioner, to get instructions from her client to the court’s suggestions to postpone the rally to Sunday it would cause less inconvenience to the people.

The judge told the petitioner not to allow ego take precedence and consider alternatives suggested by the court and the police.

Ms Reddy submitted that the city police had rejected permission for the rally citing various reasons, including participation of extremists and law and order problems.

She said denying permission would amount to suppression of democratic right of expression and speech.

Citing various judgments of the Supreme Court, Ms Reddy said that reasonable restrictions on taking out a rally would be understandable, but the police was putting exclusionary conditions.

She said that earlier rallies taken out by TJAC had been peaceful.

TS advocate-general K. Ramakrishna Reddy, arguing on behalf of the police, submitted that the police had information that the TJAC was trying to mobilise large gathering, on the lines of recent “Jallikattu” agitation in Tamil Nadu.

He told the court that the TJAC had initially sought permission for a gathering of 1,000 to 1,500 youth, but after applying for permission, TJAC activists have toured the state, covering 138 places, including universities and important colleges to mobilise a large number of people.

He said several of earlier agitations by TJAC witnessed vandalism, arson and violence which led to destruction of public and private property, besides causing injuries to police personnel and large-scale inconvenience to the public.

The A-G said that since the petitioner was not willing to specify the number of likely participants, there appeared to be an ulterior motive.