The Supreme Court on Monday said although the right to protest is a fundamental right, blocking the road at Shaheen Bagh was a cause of concern since it might spur such actions by other groups too, leading to chaos.
A bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and K M Joseph asked senior advocate Sanjay Hegde to talk to the Shaheen Bagh protesters to persuade them to shift to some other venue from the important road connecting Delhi and Noida.
“Reasons must prevail upon them, as we are concerned about the blocking of the road,” the bench said.
The top court put the petitions for a direction to Delhi police to remove the road blockade at Shaheen Bagh, where hundreds of women and children launched their sit-in on December 15, for further consideration on February 24.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Delhi Police, felt the message should not seem as if every institution has been "kneeling and praying to the protesters".
"For some reason, you have not gone there. If nothing works out, we will leave it to you," the bench told Mehta, who maintained that talks were held with welfare and market associations to lift restrictions on road.
Taking up the petitions by advocate Amit Sahni and BJP leader Nand Kishore Garg, the bench said the protesters are aggrieved by particular legislation (the Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019), the petitions against which were pending before the court.
"They may get favourable or unfavourable judgement... our intrinsic concern is if everybody starts blocking the road or public area. The question is where to protest. It should not be on the street," the bench said.
The court sought help from Hegde as interlocutor and asked him to take along the help of former CIC Wajahat Habibullah and advocate Sadhana Ramachandran.
Habibullah has along with Bhim Army Chief Chandra Shekhar Azad filed an intervention application in the matter.