A day after getting a bloody nose in the Calcutta High Court which threw out Mamata Banerjee’s orders banning Durga idol immersion on Muharram day, the Bengal Chief Minister dug up an ‘interpretive’ loophole in the court order to slip through her dictation making police permission mandatory for immersion processions.
Seeking to interpret the Court order which allowed immersion on all days till 12 in the night “if permissible” senior advocate and Trinamool Congress MP cited the stipulations in page 16 of the order saying “the word ‘if permissible’ leaves enough scope of interpretation and if there are two interpretations then law does not prohibit following any one of the two.”
He added “going by the order in that case the Government has decided to make police permission necessary for immersion processions and if the police think it fit to give the permission then the immersion procession is on.”
The MP’s statement came hours after a Cabinet meeting (and a meeting with SPs and other top officials) that gave the police the necessary directions to decide which immersion procession was permissible and which was not. The MP also said that the State Government was not preferring an appeal in the Supreme Court because, “there is nothing to show in the High Court order that it has ousted and defeated the real intention of the Government which is to maintain peace and harmony in the State.”
Hearing a petition challenging the Chief Minister’s much publicised directive — apparently to amuse the minority gallery — postponing Durga Idol immersion on Muharram day, the Division Bench of Chief Justice RK Tewari and Justice Harish Tandon had on Thursday set aside the Government order wondering why it was trying to discriminate among communities simply on the basis of assumptions.
Even as the High Court on Friday reiterated that it had allowed immersion on all days the “selective interpretation by the Government has apparently left ample scope for the Chief Minister who is also the Police Minister to enforce her original plans suspending Durga Idol immersion — post 10 pm on September 30 till the morning of October 2 and make way for Muharram rallies,” legal fraternity ruled.
Apart from what her critics called “selective interpretation of the order" to evade its real import Banerjee also went about personally telling Durga Puja organisers most of who were Trinamool Congress leaders to avoid immersion on Muharram day even as she went inaugurating Durga Pujas from one pandal to the other.
“I have my own views on crucial issues which I endorse for the general good of the State. I hope the organisers of this Puja will abide by the course chosen by us and organise the immersion programme on October 2 so that the deep conspiracy being hatched by some people in Delhi is thwarted,” Banerjee told during the inauguration of a Puja in South Kolkata.