Saharanpur riots: Supreme Court rejects plea for urgent hearing on violence

NEW DELHI: A vacation bench of the Supreme Court on Friday rejected a plea by a lawyer for an urgent hearing in the anti-Dalit violence that has rocked UP’s Saharanpur district and an immediate direction to the state to set up a special investigation team headed by a sitting high court judge to probe the violence.

The bench comprising justices L. Nageshwar Rao and Navin Sinha rejected the petition, filed by Delhi-based lawyer Gaurav Yadava, which also urged the court to provide adequate safety and security to the Dalits in Saharanpur.

Dalits have been at the receiving end of the violence perpetrated by the upper caste Thakurs and the state was a silent spectator, the petition claimed and demanded that the state government immediately take relief measures and also provide compensation to the Dalits for any loss of life and property.

But the bench, before which the petition was mentioned first thing in the morning, refused an urgent hearing. The regular hearing will take at least a month given the court’s crowded business list.

Yadava charged the local administration and police with having acted in a biased manner and not undertaking an honest probe to find out who was responsible for the violence, let alone punish them.