The Supreme Court on Monday said that people can't claim absolute right to hold protests, though they may hold peaceful agitation without causing inconvenience to the general public.
A bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Aniruddha Bose and Krishna Murari said that there cannot be a universal policy on the 'Right to Protest' because situations and facts are different every time. The court said the question was to balance the right to protest should be balanced with the right to movement of people.
"There cannot be a universal policy because situations and facts are different every time. In a parliamentary democracy, there is always an avenue of debate. The only issue is how to balance it," the bench said.
The court reserved its order on a batch of petitions seeking direction to the Delhi police for lifting the Shaheen Bagh protest organised earlier to this year here to oppose CAA-NPR-NRC.
The bench said that it had appointed "interlocutors" as an experiment and they had suggested some measures which can be looked into.
"There were some supervening circumstances which came into play and it was no one's hand. God almighty itself intervened," said the bench.
The court noted that the Covid-19 pandemic led to a change in the situation so the experiment carried out by way of appointing interlocutors could not be seen. The court had on February 17 appointed senior advocates Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran as interlocutors to resolve the impasse due to protest started since December 15, 2019. They submitted their reports in March.
Taking note of the submissions of lawyers including Shashank Deo Sudhi, the bench said: "We have to balance right to protest and the blocking of roads. We have to deal with the issue. Their cannot be universal policy as the situation may vary on case to case basis.
On Monday, advocate Amit Sahni, who filed the petition for removing the road blockade, contended such kind of protests should not take place in future. "Political compulsion cannot be the reason to continue such protests. Despite the direction not to block roads, the protests went on for 100 days," he said, asking the court to pass directions for future.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said the matter may not survive now as the protest was over. He, however, maintained that there can't be an absolute right to protest.
Advocate Mahmood Pracha, appearing for intervenors contended the state machinery was misused, as the protests proceeded for months peacefully. "There should be a universal policy for holding such demonstrations, as people have a right to peaceful protest," he said.
"We have the right to protest. State machinery is not sacrosanct. Members of a political party went there with the police and created the situation," he said.
(With inputs from PTI)
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