New Delhi, March 7
The Supreme Court today took the Haryana Government to task for its failure to nab those who had held up road and rail traffic from January 15-26 and damaged property.

“How long we will go on accepting this? It is part of governance,” a Bench comprising Justices GS Singhvi and AK Ganguly told Additional Advocate-General Manjit Singh Dalal and Additional Solicitor-General Harin Rawal, who appeared for the Railway Board.

The Bench made the remark when the two counsel sought an additional two weeks to identify the sponsors of the bandh and initiate action to recover the losses arising from the damage done to state and railway property.

According to reports, the dharna had been organised in protest against the criminal cases filed against about upper caste persons who had allegedly attacked Dalits in Mirchpur village on April 21, 2010.

The court pointed that the way democracy was run by leaders, “mobocracy” also had its leaders. “Tell us the name of the party or the organisation who led this kind of agitation. That also you don’t know,” the Bench remarked.

The Railway Board put the onus of identifying the bandh organisers on the state government with the Additional Solicitor-General contending that a sangharsh samiti was reportedly behind the stir. “I don’t think it is possible that a large number of people could gather and participate in the agitation without any kind of backing” as maintained by the state government, the Additional Solicitor-General argued.

The Bench wanted to know from the state as to why it had failed to take preventive action. “You can’t say your intelligence failed. We don’t want to say it has been done with the active connivance of the state. It is a matter for final adjudication,” the Judges remarked. When counsel Dalal said the state had registered cases in connection with the agitation, the court said: “Forget about cases. We know what happens after cases are registered.” At the last hearing on February 21, the SC had directed the state government and the Railways to recover the losses arising from the bandh from the stir sponsors.

Nevertheless, the Bench granted two weeks’ time to the state and the Railways to come out with the steps for recovering the losses and listed the next hearing for March 28.