Place on record Internet suspension orders, High Court to Punjab, Haryana

Chandigarh, February 29

The Punjab and Haryana High Court today asked Punjab and Haryana to place on record the “necessary orders” suspending internet services during the ongoing farmer protest.

As a bunch of petitions on the issue came up for resumed hearing this afternoon, the Bench of Acting Chief Justice Gurmeet Singh Sandhawalia and Justice Lapita Banerji referred to the Supreme Court’s decision in the case of “Anuradha Bhasin versus the Union of India”, before observing: “The law is very clear on the suspension of internet”.

Taking up the pleas seeking judicial inquiry into a protestor’s death on February 21, the Bench also questioned Punjab on the post-mortem report. “Why are you taking a week to conduct the post-mortem? What inquest proceedings have you done so far? Was it a natural death?”, the Bench questioned.

The counsel for Punjab informed the Bench that post-mortem was conducted the previous day and the report was awaited. He also submitted that a zero-FIR had been registered in the matter under Section 302 of the IPC.

The Bench also took on record an affidavit filed by the Centre stating, among other things, that four rounds of meetings had taken place with representatives of farmers.