Picture Courtesy : India.com
A three-judge Supreme Court bench led by Chief Justice Dipak Misra while hearing the plea challenging the arrests of five activists for their alleged maoist links has provided them interim relief.
It has placed all the five activists under house arrest. The five activists are – Telugu poet Varavara Rao in Hyderabad, activists Vernon Gonzalves and Arun Farreira in Mumbai, trade union activist Sudha Bharadwaj in Faridabad and civil liberties activist Gautam Navalakha in New Delhi .
The next hearing of the case is in September 6th.
Dissent is the safety valve of democracy. If you don’t allow dissent, the pressure valve of democracy will burst. Justice DY Chandrachud remarked that the accused are professors and the concern is their dissent is being muzzled.
The arrests of five activists had lead to a massive protest. Opposition parties led by the Congres, CP (M) slammed the move. Others to express outrage include NCP< JD() and Shiv Sena,
