Supreme Court asked TMC to approach Tripura High Court with plea

Time8 Webdesk
December 3, 2021
10:04 am

Abhijit Nath

Agartala: The Supreme Court on Thursday asked the Trinamool Congress to approach the High Court of Tripura with their writ petition with prayers for an investigation into acts of vandalism and hooliganism and immediate action on complaints of victims of assault, intimidation and other criminal activity.

The bench led by Justices DY Chandrachud, Surya Kant and Vikram Nath was hearing the writ petition filed by AITMC in view of the impending municipal elections in Tripura.

Appearing for the state, Solicitor General G Tushar Mehta said that the Supreme Court was misled with an affidavit filed by the AITMC stating that the High Court of Tripura was in recess. However, before the scheduled date fixed by the High Court, the petitioner preferred a present writ petition seeking identical relief, having themselves got the writ petition adjourned.

He also informed the court that a similar petition with regard to the poll violence in Calcutta came here. Your lordships relegated them to the High Court. The High Court of Calcutta is looking into it and the situation in Calcutta was much worse.

Justice Chandrachud observed, “Now the election process is complete, the results have been declared. The reason why we assumed the seisin of the matter was because our concern was that the election process must take place peacefully. We intervened only as the interest of free and fair elections is of such overall importance that we felt that the Supreme Court could not have wasted any time. Rationally, they withdraw the petition before the High Court because having come here, they cannot have a second bite in the cherry. But for the rest of the prayers, we will permit them to revive their writ petition. The circumstances in which we have assumed jurisdiction were peculiar to the situation. Whatever was urgent, we have dealt with. But the normal remedy is 226. We should trust the High Court for looking into the prayer for pursuing the criminal process, filing of complaints etc as it is the locally situated court. The Supreme Court should not take up all this exercise.”

For a free and fair investigation by an SIT headed by a retired judge into instances of hooliganism and vandalism against the petitioners, and for direction to take immediate action into complaints of victims of criminal activity, criminal assault and intimidation, Justice Chandrachud opined that the same can be addressed by the High Court.