The court also allowed state police to amend the route while accepting that the marches would terminate at the point where they had started.
Picture of an RSS procession. (Credit: Facebook/RSS)
The Supreme Court on Monday, 6 November, permitted the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) to take out its marches across Tamil Nadu on 19 or 26 November.
However, this will be subject to approval — including the modification of the proposed route of the marches by the state police that will be submitted by the RSS by 9 November.
Permitting the marches by the RSS, a bench comprising Justice Surya Kant and Justice Dipankar Datta also allowed the state police to amend the route while accepting that the marches would terminate at the point where they had started.
The Tamil Nadu government had moved the Supreme Court challenging the state high court’s order permitting the rallies.
In the course of the hearing, senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the Tamil Nadu government and the state police, made it clear that they could not have permitted the RSS marches from 22 October to 29 October in view of the festival season and to maintain the law-and-order situation.
The bench was also told that the initial proposed route was through a crowded commercial area passing in the proximity of the three mosques.
When Justice Surya Kant pointed out that the organisers had left the choice of the route to the state police and assured that they would carry no weapons, Sibal said that RSS marches could not have been permitted from 22 to 29 October on account festival season and similar requests by the parties of the ruling alliance in the state — including the CPI(M) — to hold gatherings were rejected.
Rohtagi said that the police would now permit one route march in each district and not three as has been proposed, stating, “We know their intention. The state is free from communal clashes.”
As both Sibal and Rohatgi urged the bench to stay the contempt proceedings against the top echelon of the state police, the bench, keeping the matter pending, posted the matter after three weeks, telling them to apprise the high court of the proceedings before it (the top court).
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