On Wednesday, the Supreme Court shall hear a batch of pleas filed which are related to the violence incurred on the day of the tractor rally in the national capital. One of these petitions is also about setting up of a commission headed by a retired Supreme Court judge to inquire into the incident.
This plea has been filed by advocate Vishal Tiwari which seeks to establish a three-member inquiry commission under the chairmanship of a former Supreme court judge and to comprise of two retired high court judges. The purpose of the committee shall be to record and collect evidence and submit a report on the violence which erupted during the tractor rally on January 26.
The petition will be heard by an apex court bench constituting Chief Justice S A Bobde and Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian.
He has also sought a direction to the concerned authority to lodge FIRs against individuals or organisations responsible for the violence and causing dishonour of the National Flag on January 26.
Another petition has been filed by advocate Manohar Lal Sharma who has sought a direction to the concerned authority as well as the media not to declare farmers as "terrorist" without any evidence.
Sharma has claimed in his plea that there was a “planned conspiracy” to sabotage the protest by farmers’ and they were allegedly declared as “terrorist” without any evidence.
He has sought directions to prohibit propagation of “false allegations and actions declaring” farmers as terrorist without any evidence.
Besides the petitions filed by Tiwari and Sharma, the court would also hear some other pleas related to the incident.
In his petition, Tiwari has said that farmers’ protest against the three new agri laws is going on for over two months but it took a “violent turn” during the tractor parade.
“Unfortunately, the tractor march took a violent turn leaving injuries and destruction of public property. This incident also effected the daily life of the public. The internet services were interrupted as government ordered the operators to suspend the same. In the present time, the internet services are very essential to carry out the work in different professions especially in advocacy as the courts and our Supreme Court of India is functioning online,” Tiwari has said in his plea.
It said that clash between the farmers and police on the Republic Day has caught the attention of the entire world.
“The matter is serious because when the protest was going on peacefully for last two months then suddenly, how it turned into violent movement and led violence on January 26. The question for consideration in national security and public interest arises that who is responsible for creating the disturbance and how and who turned the peaceful farmer protest into violent movement or how and who created the circumstances which let the protest turn violent,” it said.
The plea said there may be some conspiracy by some “notorious forces or organizations” to cause disturbance and damage the peaceful protest and create clash between police and protesting farmers.
On January 20, the Centre had withdrawn its application, filed through Delhi Police, seeking an injunction against the proposed tractor march on January 26 after the apex court had said that issue of tractor rally by farmers protesting against the new farms laws was in “executive domain”.
On January 12, the apex court had stayed the implementation of the contentious new farm laws till further orders and constituted a four-member committee to make recommendations to resolve the impasse over them between the Centre and farmers' unions protesting at Delhi borders.
The members of the court-appointed committee were -- Bhupinder Singh Mann, National President of Bhartiya Kisan Union, All India Kisan Coordination Committee; Parmod Kumar Joshi, Director for South Asia, International Food Policy Research Institute; Ashok Gulati, agricultural economist and former chairman of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices, and Anil Ghanwat, President of Shetkari Sanghatana.
Later, Mann had recused himself from the committee.
The top court had on January 12 said it would hear the pleas against the farm laws after eight weeks when the committee would give its suggestions to resolve the impasse after talking to the protesters and the government.
Thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, are protesting at various border points of Delhi for over a month now against the three laws -- the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, and the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act.
With PTI Inputs
