SC issues notice to Centre on Ramdev's eviction

Taking suo motu cognisance of forceful eviction of yoga guru Baba Ramdev and his followers from the Ramlila grounds in New Delhi, the Supreme Court has sought the Centre's response on the incident.A vacation bench of justices B S Chauhan and Swatenter Kumar on Monday issued notices to the Union Home Secretary, Chief Secretary of Delhi, Delhi administration, and Delhi Police Commissioner asking them to respond within two weeks.The court asked them to reply as to what were the circumstances under which the people had to be dispersed in the midnight by the use of force.

The court posted the matter for hearing in the second week of July. However, the court declined to entertain a petition filed by advocate Ajay Aggarwal on the issue.
The bench expressed its displeasure that before the matter came up for hearing before it, the entire contents of the petition were leaked to the media.Police had cracked down on Baba Ramdev and thousands of his supporters at Ramlila Maidan on Saturday night, forcibly ending their hunger strike on corruption and black money issues.

When the advocate mentioned the petition, the bench interrupted him and expressed displeasure that its contents were leaked."We are shocked to learn that before the file reaches us, the contents have been published in the media. All the grounds raised in the petition have been published in the newspaper. Further it has been reported that the matter has been listed for hearing today at 10:30 am. Why it is so?" the bench asked.

The bench said it has not seen the file about the matter which has already come in the media."In view of this, though it is not able to probe how the contents of the petition are leaked, we are not inclined to entertain this petition," the bench said.The petitioner had sought a direction to the government to issue a white paper on the entire episode leading to the eviction of the yoga guru and the alleged barbaric police action against his followers.Meanwhile prohibitory orders are in force throughout Muzaffarnagar district in Uttar Pradesh and police have been deployed in three check posts in the state bordering Uttarakhand to prevent Baba Ramdev's entry.District authorities have posted police at Bhuraheri check-post on Haridwar-Delhi national highway in Muzaffarnagar and Biharighar and Bharawala check-posts in Saharanpur and Bijnore districts respectively.