The midnight crackdown on Baba Ramdev and his followers at the Ramlila Maidan during their protest against corruption was a result of an “entire mess” created by them and the yoga guru should take “responsibility” for it, Delhi Police told the Supreme Court on Friday.
The Police also justified the involvement of Home Minister P. Chidambaram for maintaining the law and order situation at the venue saying that mala fide cannot be attributed to him as he was obviously “worried” when the gathering exceeded the capacity and his action was “Constitutionally permissible”.
“If you have a capacity of 50,000 and it went up to 1 lakh at the Ramlila Maidan, the Home Minister will be worried and Union Government is expected to maintain order.
“Does it become mala fide if Delhi Police Commissioner is in touch with the Home Minister and Home Secretary,” Delhi Police counsel and senior advocate Harish Salve asked before a bench comprising justices B.S. Chauhan and Swatanter Kumar.
He said the organisers of the event had “not given correct impression” as to how the situation of chaos was created.
“What happened was unfortunate and unpleasant but who is responsible,” the senior advocate said while blaming Baba Ramdev and his followers.
“They (Baba Ramdev and his followers) had created the entire mess. The police had gone to Ramdev giving certain reasons as to why the permission for holding protest has to be cancelled and why he has to call off his ongoing programme.
“But he jumped and started running away. Ramdev has to take responsibility. The irresponsible behaviour of those present at the venue were responsible for the so called midnight crackdown. Police was not there to remove the people,” Mr. Salve said.
The Delhi Police was responding to the sharp reactions of the Supreme Court which on November 21, 2011 had asked it to explain the reasons for not waiting till the morning of June 5, 2011.
Mr. Salve said there was a great degree of “bonhomie” between the organisers and the government before the incident which was reflected from the letter written by Baba Ramdev to the Prime Minister on June 2 or 3, 2011.
He questioned the organisers for pointing fingers at the Delhi Police and said the same force received accolades from Team Anna which chose the same venue for their demonstration.
“After his (Baba Ramdev’s), the Anna Hazare protest took place there. Team Anna was critical of all except Delhi Police,” he said.
The Delhi Police explained the circumstances and the sequence of events which formed the basis for using excessive force and lobbing tear gas shells at the Ramlila Maidan on the midnight of June 4-5, 2011.
Senior advocate Ram Jethmalani, appearing for the Bharat Swabhiman Trust headed by Baba Ramdev, had alleged that the midnight crackdown was an attempt crush the peaceful protest.
He had compared the incident with the atrocities during the Nazi era in Germany and accused Mr. Chidambaram of being responsible for the crackdown in which a woman died and several others were injured.
“Are we living under dictatorship or a Nazi rule that Baba Ramdev shall not be allowed to carry out his protest and will not be allowed to stay in Delhi,” Mr. Jethmalani had said.
The Supreme Court had on June 6, 2011 taken suo motu cognisance of the police action and asked the Centre and Delhi Police to explain why it resorted to such an action in the middle of the night.
The Delhi Police, in its affidavit, denied the allegation that it had used force and claimed teargas shells were fired only after Baba Ramdev’s supporters turned violent and pelted stones at the police.
Justifying its action, police had said the authorities had granted permission to Baba Ramdev to use the ground only to hold a yoga camp and not for any other purpose.
