The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) challenging the 12-hour ‘Bangla Bandh’ called by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The plea was dismissed on grounds that the petitioner, Sanjoy Das, a lawyer claiming to practice at the high court, had been perpetually debarred from filing PILs by a previous court order.
The division bench led by Chief Justice T S Sivagnanam, along with Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharyya, noted that Das had been found to have made false statements in an earlier petition. In that case, Das had sought a change in the roster for a judge presiding over matters of police inaction or overaction, actions for which the court had previously imposed a fine of Rs 50,000 and barred him from filing any future PILs.
The court highlighted that Das had abused the judicial process, attempted to intimidate the office of the chief justice, and made false representations about himself, leading to his petition being dismissed with exemplary costs.
The ‘Bangla Bandh’ initiated by the BJP began statewide at 6 am as a protest against police actions during the ‘Nabanna Abhijan,’ a march to the secretariat organized by the student group Chatra Samaj. This march was in response to the alleged rape and murder of a doctor at RG Kar Hospital.
