Ten social activists have come out in support of lawyer Prashant Bhushan in the Supreme Court, contending that the contempt proceedings initiated against him appears to be an assault on freedom of speech and expression.
The activists have filed an application to intervene in the contempt plea filed by Attorney General KK Venugopal against Bhushan for his tweets in which he had said that the Government appeared to have misled the top court and perhaps submitted fabricated minutes of meeting of the high-powered selection committee headed by the Prime Minister, in the appointment of M Nageswara Rao as interim CBI director.
The activists, including Aruna Roy, Arundhati Roy and Shailesh Gandhi, have said in their application that they were “concerned” about initiation of the contempt proceeding against Bhushan for exercising his ‘freedom of speech’ without fear.
Besides, a separate application has also been filed in the top court by five senior journalists, including former union minister Arun Shourie, seeking to intervene in the case.
Shourie and four others have said in their application that the court, while issuing notice to Bhushan on February 6 on the contempt plea, had said it would examine whether in sub-judice matters, advocates and litigants briefing the media would amount to interference in course of administration of justice.