SC dismisses review petition terming Shaheen Bagh protests illegal

The right to protest cannot be anytime and everywhere, the Supreme Court said in an order, dismissing a review petition filed by 12 activists challenging an October 2020 ruling of the top court terming the anti-citizenship law protests held at Shaheen Bagh to be illegal.

A three-judge bench of Justices SK Kaul, Aniruddha Bose and Krishna Murari stuck by its previous ruling that protests were meant to be held in designated places and the police will be within its rights to remove persons holding protest outside designated places.

Dismissing the review petitions in chambers on February 9, the three judges held, “The right to protest cannot be anytime and everywhere. There may be some spontaneous protests, but in case of prolonged dissent or protest, there cannot be continued occupation of public place affecting rights of others.” The order was put out in public domain on Friday.

The court dismissed the petition filed by Kaniz Fatima and 11 others and declined the request made in the review petition to list the matter in open court.

The October ruling came in the context of the protests held against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA conducted at south Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh area. The protests started on December 15, 2019 and ended only after a lockdown imposed by the Central government on March 24 last year in order to curb the spread of Covid-19 came into force. The protests threw traffic out of gear in Shaheen Bagh, prompting one Amit Sahni, a resident of Delhi, to file a public interest litigation (PIL) before the Apex court, resulting in the October 7 decision.

The top court had ruled, “We have to make it unequivocally clear that public ways and public spaces cannot be occupied in such a manner and that too indefinitely. Democracy and dissent go hand in hand, but then the demonstrations expressing dissent have to be in designated places alone.”

Since the protest at Shaheen Bagh blocked one of the key thoroughfares to Noida, the protest was held to be illegal.

The review petition under Article 137 of the Constitution had raised five grounds to challenge the October order. The main ground for review was the vast powers the judgment conferred on police, leaving scope for its abuse.

The petitioners stated, “Prima facie the order under review appears to be giving way to an unrestricted sanction to the police to take action by misusing these observations…. Such observations may prove to be a license in the hands of the police to commit atrocities on legitimate voice of protest, especially protesters coming from vulnerable sections of the social strata.”

Further, it argued that the observation of the court that protests could be held at ‘designated places alone’ went against the five-judge bench decision of the Supreme Court in Himat Lal Shah case decided in September 1972. This decision upheld the right of a citizen to hold public meetings on public streets. The petitioners complained that before altering this principle, the apex bench did not hear the protestors.

Considering all questions raised in the review petition, the review order said, “We have considered the earlier judicial pronouncements and recorded our opinion that the Constitutional scheme comes with a right to protest and express dissent but with an obligation to have certain duties.”

The review petitioners had submitted that the judgment of the top court would lead to a situation where the administration would never engage in dialogue with protestors but would instead take action against them including their prosecution. “The order takes away the constitutional protection guaranteed to peaceful protestors….to put any curbs on this freedom to show dissent (towards government policies, legislations and other acts and omissions) leaves the citizens with no resort whatsoever to voice their concerns,” Fatima and others stated in their petition filed by advocate Kabir Dixit.

The bench having gone through the review petition and record of its earlier order said, “We are convinced that the order of which review has been sought, does not suffer from any error apparent warranting its reconsideration.” The review petitions were dismissed on this count.