Delhi Violence: Harsh Mander, Brinda Karat Withdraw Pleas for FIRs

The Delhi HC was hearing the batch of petitions filed with various pleas related to the northeast Delhi violence

This vehicle was a kind of demarcation between the pro and anti-CAA protesters, during the violence on 24 February, at the Maujpur-Jaffrabad road, in northeast Delhi.

(Photo: Aishwarya S Iyer/The Quint)

After another hearing in the Delhi High Court where the Delhi Police had failed to reply to all the petitions on the Delhi riots, several petitioners including Harsh Mander and Brinda Karat have withdrawn their pleas to the high court, and will instead make their pleas to relevant magistrate courts, Live Law reported.

The Delhi High Court on Monday, 27 July, was hearing the batch of petitions filed with various pleas relating to the violence which rocked northeast Delhi in February. The Delhi Police were supposed to respond to all the petitions accepted by the court, including those asking for FIRs to be registered against political leaders for instigating the violence, and those asking for lists of all those arrested in connection with the riots to be made public.

Some petitioners stated that the Delhi Police had not yet responded to their specific prayers in their petitions, and the court was unable to find the police's response to certain other pleas within the documents submitted. As a result, the bench headed by Delhi HC Chief Justice DN Patel decided to adjourn the case to next week so that the Delhi Police could ensure they had submitted and referenced all relevant submissions.

Following this, however, some of the petitioners, including social activist and former IAS officer Harsh Mander, as well as the CPI(M)'s Brinda Karat, decided to withdraw their pleas. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing Mander, and Adit Pujari, representing Karat, said they would withdraw their petitions from before the high court and instead take up their requests (for FIRs against BJP leaders Kapil Mishra, Anurag Thakur and Parvesh Verma) with the relevant magistrates instead. Pujari noted that Karat had already filed an application with the magistrate for this, which had been put on hold pending the high court's decision.

Earlier in the hearings, following submissions by petitioner Ajay Gautam, who had asked for FIRs against opposition politicians for supposedly instigating the violence, Additional Solicitor General Pinky Anand had pointed out that pleas for the registration of FIRs should not be made to the high court as these were not maintainable under its writ jurisdiction under Article 226, Live Law reported.

(With inputs from Live Law)