Red flag for Amit Shah’s Bengal rath yatra from court, upset BJP to appeal

The Calcutta High Court on Thursday denied permission to Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) to hold a rath yatra, which was to be flagged off by party president Amit Shah from Cooch Behar on Friday.

The High Court ordered that the rath yatra cannot take place till the next date of hearing, January 9, when it would consider reports from the 24 districts through which the rally was to pass.

The Calcutta High Court has deferred the rally until the Superintended of Police of respective districts speak to BJP presidents (of those districts) and file a report by December 21, according to news agency ANI.

The BJP will be approaching a division bench on Friday morning against Calcutta High Court’s order, ANI reported.

“We will be going to division bench tomorrow morning. We will seek justice that any peaceful democratic movement is permissible under Indian Constitution,” West Bengal BJP vice president Jay Prakash Majumdar told ANI.

The Mamata Banerjee government told a bench of Calcutta High Court it will not give itsapproval for the rath yatra . The state’s advocate general informed a bench of justice Tapabrata Chakraborty on Thursday morning about the decision.

“In a democratic set up all political parties are at liberty to pursue their programme. The government has no business stopping it,” said Dilip Ghosh, president of the BJP’s West Bengal unit, before the hearing.

“If the administration denies us permission, we can also say that we will go ahead with the programme without your consent. The programme will set out and reach its destination. None can prevent it,” Ghosh said.