Plea in Supreme Court to reconstitute panel probing violence during CJP protests

An application has been filed before the Supreme Court seeking the reconstitution of the high-powered enquiry committee set up on the court's orders to probe alleged police excesses during the recent Cockroach Janata Party (CJP)-led protests at Delhi's Jantar Mantar.

The matter was mentioned this morning before a Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana.

On August 18, the Court had constituted a five-member committee headed by retired apex court Justice R Subhash Reddy to probe allegations of police excesses against Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) protestors, as well as counter-allegations of injuries to police personnel and property damage by protestors.

The other committee members included former Punjab and Haryana High Court Chief Justice Ravi Shankar Jha, former Delhi High Court Justice Shalinder Kaur, former CBI Director Rishi Kumar Shukla and former Meghalaya DGP LR Bishnoi as its members.

An application has now been filed seeking the modification of this committee's composition.

Senior Advocate Gopal Sankaranayanan appeared on behalf of the applicant today, and sought directions for the listing of the application some time next week.

Solicitor General (SG) Tushar Mehta strongly opposed the application, questioning whether it was politically motivated.

"It's a very mischievous application. Let it be listed with the main matter. The prayer is to reconstitute the committee constituted by Your Lordships and investigating some minister, so-and-so, and they have given names that this judge should be heading it, etc. But this is not a political platform. Something else is happening. I'm not saying what the contents of the application are. This is something else which is happening," he said.

CJI Kant also expressed concerns about the application's contents.

"We don't appreciate the mentioning of the names," he said.

"I just said the application may be listed. I'm not (taking names) ... Even when the application is listed, I'm not going to mention names, as I didn't last time. None of us mentioned names. We gave it up and tried it. There's a way of doing these things. So we just request that the application be listed. That's all," Sankaranarayanan replied.

The Court eventually said it would hear the application seeking the committee's reconstitution along with the main batch of petitions filed on alleged police excesses and connected issues during the CJP protests.

The protests had begun in June on a call by the CJP against repeated question paper leaks. The protestors demanded the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who has since resigned from the position.

The protests gained momentum after climate activist Sonam Wangchuk joined and started a hunger strike in solidarity. Wangchuk was later removed from the protest site and taken to a hospital by the Delhi Police, citing his worsening health condition. He ended his 26-day hunger strike at Medanta Hospital late on July 23.

Meanwhile, Delhi Police and the Rapid Action Force (RAF) reportedly restored to lathi charge, teargas shelling and the use of pellet guns to stop the CJP protestors on a "Sansad Chalo" march to the Parliament on July 20.

Pradhan eventually tendered his resignation as minister on July 25 and the protests were called off.

Similar protests were witnessed in Bihar as well, where the police took similar action. A policeman was also witnessed using an AK-47 rifle against the protestors in Bihar.

These events led to the batch of petitions before the apex court.

The matter is likely to be heard next in September.

[Live Coverage]