HIS MASTER'S VOICE

Tushar Mehta holds court

- ATUL DEV

{ONE}

TUSHAR MEHTA STOOD before a bench of S Muralidhar and Talwant Singh in the Delhi High Court. It was half past noon on 26 February, and Mehta had just rushed in.

Two petitioners had approached the court the previous day, seeking orders for the Delhi Police to register first-information reports against several leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party. For the last three days, Hindu mobs had been marauding through northeastern Delhi, attacking Muslims residents and their businesses and homes. Dozens had already been killed, and attacks continued even as the court convened that day. The BJP leaders had delivered hate-filled, communally charged speeches in the run-up to the violence, which had been recorded and circulated to the point of ubiquity. But the police had refused to act on complaints accusing the BJP leaders of incitement.

The petitioners had asked to be heard the previous day, as soon as they approached the court. DN Patel, the chief justice of the Delhi High Court, was on leave, and a bench led by GN Sistani, the judge second in rank to Patel, did not find the matter urgent enough, despite the continuing violence. Sistani scheduled the petition to be heard in Patel’s court on 26 February.

But Patel did not come to court the next day either, and Sistani was absent too. The petitioners’ lawyer went to Muralidhar, the top-ranking judge after Patel and Sistani, and he agreed to an urgent hearing. In a matter of minutes, Muralidhar scheduled the hearing for 12.30 pm and issued a notice to the Delhi Police.