New Delhi, Aug. 31 -- The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a Delhi Police plea seeking to withdraw 13 FIRs linked to protests over the NEET paper leak and register a fresh case against 2,873 people allegedly present at the demonstrations.
A bench headed by Chief Justice Surya Kant and comprising Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana took up the matter after Solicitor General Tushar Mehta sought an urgent hearing. Mehta said the police wanted to move an interlocutory application invoking Article 142 of the Constitution.
According to the application, the Centre's July 25 decision led Delhi Police to stop pursuing the 13 FIRs related to the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) protests. However, police said 2,873 people present at the protest site were prima facie found to have serious criminal antecedents in the National Crime Records Bureau database. It sought permission to file a fresh FIR limited to these individuals to investigate possible involvement in offences involving bodily harm or property damage.
The police said no new FIR would cover incidents already included in the existing cases.
The plea comes ahead of a CJP protest march planned for Teachers' Day, led by families of students who died by suicide following the NEET controversy and people alleging police excesses during the agitation.
The Supreme Court had earlier appointed a committee headed by former judge Justice R Subhash Reddy to examine allegations of police excesses.
On August 3, the court clarified that "criminal antecedents" referred only to involvement in grave and heinous offences. The 36-day agitation, which began on June 20, was withdrawn on July 25 after the then education minister Dharmendra Pradhan resigned and the government accepted the group's other demands.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.