On 22 December, the Madras High Court held a special sitting to hear the pleas of the conduct of rallies against the Citizenship Amendment Act, announced by opposition parties in Tamil Nadu.
On Sunday evening the HC bench headed by Justice S Vaidyanathan and Justice PT Asha heard the pleas on an urgent basis and passed an interim order directing the use of police drones to monitor the rallies, to avoid any violence taking place during the protests against the CAA.
“As an interim measure, in the event of the political parties proceeding with the agitation “DESPITE REFUSAL” there shall be an interim direction to the Police in that the area, including the diverted areas as found mentioned in the pamphlet of the respondents … for which the permission for procession is sought should be video graphed and the drone technology can also be used to record the demonstration so that the liability can be foisted on the leaders and not on the followers,” stated the Interim order.
Jayaprakash Narayan the Government pleader for the State, informed the Court that the police did not grant permission for the rallies since they did not respond to a query of ‘whether they would take responsibility for the violence that may follow during the protest.’
“The evasive manner in which a responsible political party has answered the queries gives rise to a doubt in the mind of the Court that the leaders, who are spearheading the agitation are reluctant to take responsibility in the event of any damage to the public property or any untoward incident,” the bench observed
The next hearing of the matter has been listed on 30 December.
