India Tomorrow
NEW DELHI—The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a petition challenging the Tripura Police’s decision to invoke the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) against two Supreme Court lawyers, human rights activists, and several journalists, including Shyam Meera Singh.
The assurance to hear the plea was given by a bench headed by Chief Justice of India NV Ramana on a petition filed by Advocate Prashant Bhushan.
The CJI initially suggested filing the plea before the appropriate high court. However, he agreed to hear when cited urgency of the issue by Adv Bhushan.
The Tripura police recently booked as many as 102 social media users, including Supreme Court advocates Mukesh Kumar, Ehtesham Hashmi, and Amit Srivastava and Ansar Indori, journalist Shyam Meera Singh and Meer Faisal, and several activists including Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan on various charges including Section 13 of UAPA.
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The petitioners have sought quashing of the FIR against them. The FIR says that posts filed by some of the accused persons were “intended to disrupt the sovereignty and integrity of India and it amounts to Unlawful Activities as defined under the Unlawful Activities Act 1967.”
