After receiving the affidavit of Delhi Police justifying its mid-night swoop on Baba Ramdev’s supporters at Ramleela grounds earlier this month, Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to yoga guru’s Bharat Swabhiman Trust.
A vacation bench of Justices P. Sathasivam and A.K. Patnaik sought an affidavit from the Trust’s Delhi wing, giving details about its version on police action.
Since the apex court had taken suo motu notice on the police action on the intervening night of June 4/5, after taking into account the newspaper reports about police’s alleged highhandedness, the bench though it necessary to take the views of both sides.
The bench further directed the Delhi Police to supply the copy of its affidavit to the functionaries of the trust to enable them to respond to their contentions and posted the matter for further hearing on July 11.
The Supreme Court told senior advocate Udai Lalit, appearing for the Delhi Police that his client had made several allegations against Baba Ramdev and his followers, hence the other side was also entitled to place its submissions on record.
The police in its affidavit had claimed that no force was used against Baba Ramdeve’s supports while justifying their mid-night eviction from Ramleela ground, claiming that there was “danger” to the life of the yoga guru.
The police admitted that it lobbed “eight” teargas shells bud denied resorting to “lathi-charge”. The teargas shells were also lobbed only after the supporters of the Baba had resorted to brickbating, the police had claimed.
Advocate Ajay Agrawal, whose petition was kept aside earlier on the issue by the top court, on Monday persisted that he should be heard as it was he who brought the matter before the court.
Agrawal even cited the order of June 6, when the court converted the matter into “suo motu” notice, saying that the title of the case was recorded in the order as “Ajay K Agrawal verses Shri Manmohan Singh and Others”.
Agrawal in his petition had named the Prime Minister as respondent and the order of June 6, the copy which was cited by him before the bench on Monday clearly mentioned his name in the case title, and claimed his right to argue it on the merits.