Wailing women bring SC to a halt

New Delhi, Jan. 11: A dramatic scene was witnessed on Thursday in the Supreme Court when a group of wailing women brought the proceedings to a halt for about half an hour and made Justice J. Chelameswar recuse from the case.

The women, mostly middleaged, stormed the Court number 2 and started crying and speaking loudly before a bench of Justices J. Chelameswar and Sanjay Kishan Kaul.

Just before their entry, the bench, while hearing a contempt petition, had ordered vacating of flats in the Modern Co- operative Group Housing Society at Sector- 15 of Rohini in northwest Delhi.

The bench had ordered that the counsel for the alleged contemnors have undertaken to hand over possession of the within a week to purge themselves of the contempt.

It had categorically directed that the society flats which were in dispute have to be vacated within a week and no further time will be given to them and had listed the matter for hearing after a week.

Minutes after the order was passed, several women entered the court room, crying and wailing and saying that they do not have anywhere else to go and have been staying in the society for decades.

Some women also said they had taken loan from banks and will be financially burdened if they were forced to move out.

As chaos prevailed in the court room, the two judges talked among themselves and left the dais at 12.05 pm.