The Supreme Court said in a special hearing on Sunday that according to the law, unhindered movement of people will be allowed in the city. Also, no one will be detained except according to the procedure prescribed in law.
The court said that people will have the right to assemble outside the area where Section 163 of BNSS is applicable. The court also said that no one will be stopped from personally reaching the Supreme Court or any other court to get justice.
The protests in Delhi on Saturday were led by activists of the Cockroach Janata Party and leftist student organizations. A two-member bench of Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice V. Mohana is hearing the case.
During the hearing, the Supreme Court has sought compliance report from the authorities by Tuesday and details of the detained people.
The Supreme Court said these important things during the hearing -
Metros and trains should operate normally unless required by law to stop.
The system of erecting barricades should be reviewed keeping in mind the law and order, traffic and provisions of Article 19(2)
Internet service will not be disrupted as per law.
No one will be detained except according to the procedure prescribed by law.
People will have the right to assemble outside the area where Section 163 of BNSS is applicable.
No one will be prevented from personally approaching the Supreme Court or any other court to seek justice.
The court has listed two cases for today's hearing.
The first case is of Habeas Corpus petition. It is a legal process under which a detained person is requested to be produced before the court and the legality of his detention is investigated.
Trinamool Congress MP and senior advocate Maneka Guruswamy has filed this petition. In this, a challenge has been raised to take precautionary custody of many opposition leaders. These include four former Chief Ministers.
These are former Chief Minister of West Bengal Mamata Banerjee, former Chief Minister of Delhi Arvind Kejriwal, former Chief Minister of Kerala Pinarayi Vijayan and former Chief Minister of Tripura Manik Sarkar.
The petition states that the police cannot arbitrarily detain leaders from their residence to suppress their fundamental right to peaceful protest.
The second case is a contempt petition of court filed by advocate Shailendra Mani Tripathi. Contempt petitions are filed when officials are accused of disobeying court orders.
Tripathi alleges that Delhi Police Commissioner Anurag Kumar and other officials, including the Chairman of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation, on Saturday violated the Supreme Court order, which had clearly banned the complete closure of public transport.
Tripathi alleges that despite this order, the entrances of 45 metro stations were closed to stop the protesters.
The lawyers are also expected to mention two other petitions during the hearing.
Mention of a matter is a procedural step whereby immediate judicial attention is requested for matters which are not included in the official hearing list for that day.
One of these petitions has been filed by Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP Manoj Jha. He is demanding the court to declare the police action on Saturday illegal. His petition has raised the issue of alleged illegal detention of more than 6,000 people, pre-emptive cancellation of 250 trains and deployment of mobile phone jammers in central Delhi.
The second petition is a contempt petition filed by advocate Aman Prasad, in which Delhi Police has been accused of using violence against people without discrimination.
Prasad's petition alleges that policemen were not wearing mandatory name tags, beat up unarmed civilians and misbehaved with women.
The petition specifically mentions the incident of dragging a woman by her hair and putting her in a bus to take her to custody. It also mentions incidents of illegal detention of journalists reporting incidents of unrest.
