CJI halts court
- A journalist’s petition relating to the Nuh violence led to the halting of the proceedings of a CJI DY Chandrachud-led constitution bench on Wednesday. The bench was hearing a bunch of petitions challenging the constitutionality of the abrogation of Article 370 in J&K.
- The petitioner approached Justice Aniruddh Bose seeking a ban on protest rallies by Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad over Nuh violence that has spread to neighbouring areas and taken six lives, besides witnessing large scale arson and attacks.
- Justice Bose asked the petitioner to approach the CJI, who took a break from the Article 370 hearing to hurriedly constitute a special bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and SVN Bhatti. Justice Khanna was on the constitution bench hearing the Article 370 matter.
- The special bench directed the central and state governments to curb hate speech, deploy additional forces and install CCTV cameras in sensitive areas.
Minister meets PM
- Union minister Rao Inderjit Singh, the Lok Sabha MP from Gurugram that covers Nuh, met PM Modi on Wednesday but declined to share what transpired during the meeting.
- Singh, however, said, “This is a matter of probe as to how they [rioters] got possession of these weapons and how such an atmosphere was created.”
RAF base in Nuh
- Nearly five years after the Centre approved a new battalion of the CRPF’s anti-riot unit RAF to be based in Nuh, the Haryana government finally sanctioned land for it this week.
- A plot of about 50 acres had been earmarked but a final declaration was delayed for a year.
- The Centre had approved raising five more RAF battalions in 2018 — one each in Varanasi, Jaipur, Shivamogga, Hajipur, and Nuh.
FIRs and arrests
- In the 48 hours till Wednesday evening since communal violence broke out in Nuh, the Haryana police have filed 67 FIRs, 57 of which are in Nuh and Gurgaon, and arrested 124 people.
States on alert
- An alert has been sounded in the bordering areas of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh – Saharanpur, Shamli and Muzaffarnagar — and Rajasthan, where Internet suspension has been extended by another day in Bharatpur and Alwar