The Uttarakhand High Court on Wednesday agreed to hear a plea by the Association for Protection of Civil Rights against proposed mahapanchayat in Uttarkashi by right-wing groups on June 15. This came soon after the vacation Bench of the Supreme Court refused to entertain the same urgent petition and had asked the petitioners to move the High Court.
A Division Bench of the Nainital High Court comprising Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice Rakesh Thapliyal will hear the matter on Thursday, June 15, which is also the day when the mahapanchayat was initially called by ‘Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyan’.
Counsel for the petitioners Sharukh Alam told the court that certain organisations had called for the mahapanchayat and have given an ultimatum to people of a particular community to leave the area before the same. She said there was urgency in the matter and the Supreme Court also granted the petitioner the liberty to approach the High Court.
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Earlier in the day, a vacation Bench comprising Justices Vikram Nath and Ahsanuddin Amanullah, while responding to the lawyer who mentioned the unlisted matter, said law and order was an issue of the State and hence the petitioners should move the High Court.
‘Why this distrust?’
“Why there is a distrust of the High Court? They also have jurisdiction. You should have some trust. Why this short-circuiting, we are not on merits or cause. Why do you distrust the administration?,” asked Justice Amanullah.
The High Court’s intervention came a day after the Uttarkashi district administration denied permission to hold the mahapanchayat and imposed Section 144 in the town where the event was scheduled to happen. As the permission was denied to ‘Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyan’, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the Bajrang Dal have now taken charge to hold the event on the proposed date and time.
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Anuj Valiyan, State coordinator, Bajrang Dal said “when those who rape women did not care about Section 144, why those trying to prevent rapes should worry about the same.”
Local traders and businessmen associations also extended support to the mahapanchayat by calling it a ‘local issue of the hill’. President of Purola Vyapar Mandal, Brij Mohan Chauhan, told The Hindu that shops in the town would remain closed until the administration removed Section 144.
“This is our local matter and we will handle it. The police and the administration should not impose such bans,” he said.
Not just the Association for Protection of Civil Rights but an urgent letter petition was also filed by Delhi University professor Apoorvanand Jha and poet Ashok Vajpeyi in the apex court requesting immediate ban on the mahapanchayat.
The People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) too had written a letter to the Chief Justice of India and the Chief Justice of the Uttarakhand High Court to immediately intervene in the escalating communal tension in the State.
Warning to Muslims
Trouble in Uttarakhand began last month after a minor girl was allegedly abducted by two youths — a Hindu and a Muslim — in Uttarkashi. The two accused were caught by locals. Later an FIR was lodged against them. After this incident, various right wing organisations, including the Bajrang Dal, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Bhairav Sena started protests against the minority community. ‘Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyan’, a right wing group which announced a mahapanchayat on June 15, has allegedly pasted posters across the city asking Muslims to leave the town. Several Muslim families were hence forced to leave the town fearing for their security.
Even as the right wing group is gearing up for its mahapanchayat, the office-bearers of the Muslim Seva Sansthan (MSS) called a mahapanchayat in the State capital Dehradun on June 18. The aim of the mahapanchayat is to draw the State government’s attention to the administration’s failure in Uttarkashi and the “exodus” of Muslims from the hill town, the MSS said.
