The Supreme Court has today agreed to hear on 4 March, the plea moved by victims of the Delhi riots, seeking immediate registration of FIRs against the BJP leaders, Kapil Mishra, Anurag Thakur, Parvesh Verma, Abhay Verma, and others for their hate speech that has allegedly incited violence in the national capital.
The bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde has further declared that the Court wishes for peace, but that it is also aware of the limitations on its functioning, including the fact that it may only come to the scene to pass appropriate orders once the event has happened.
“We are not saying people should die. That kind of pressure we are not equipped to handle. We cannot stop things from happening. We cannot give preventive relief. We feel a kind of pressure on us. We can only deal with the situation after it occurs, the kind of pressure on us, we can’t handle that,” Chief Justice Bobde observed.
“We read newspapers; we know the kind of comments that are made. Courts come on to the scene after the thing is done and courts have not been able to prevent such a thing. We wish peace.” he added.
The above observations were made by the apex court after the senior advocate Colin Gonsalves appearing for the survivors mentioned to court that the Delhi High Court had in the last week adjourned the issue for six weeks whereas people are dying every day. He had further urged the Court to intervene so that action is taken as per law, and without undue favor to influential persons.
The petition also sought a direction to the government and police to make public the full list of persons detained by police and paramilitary and to preserve all CCTV footage of violence-affected areas.
