The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court in response to a writ petition filed granted permission to conduct the rath yatra in Madurai, as part of the donation drive for Ram Temple construction in Ayodhya.
Selvakumar from Madurai had filed a petition in the Madurai bench of the Madras High Court. In it, he said, “In lieu of the Ram Mandir temple construction work which is underway in Ayodhya, we are planning to conduct a rath yatra with the objective of gathering aide from devotees. In that regard, we petitioned the Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) seeking permission to operate the vehicle with a loudspeaker in 100 wards in Madurai.”
The petition went on to say, ” The ACP refused, saying that given the curfew in force across India to curb the spread of corona, it is not possible to issue a permit in view of the law and order situation. Despite several relaxations that have been granted in the corona restrictions, the denial of permission for the rath yatra was unacceptable in a context where meetings of several political parties were permitted.”
It further went on to beseech that, “The denial of the permission was unacceptable as it was scheduled to be held for 10 consecutive days starting from 8 pm. Therefore, the order of the Tilak Stadium Assistant Commissioner who refused permission to conduct a chariot pilgrimage in Madurai should be revoked and a replacement order should be issued giving permission to conduct the pilgrimage.”
The case came up for hearing as an urgent case before Judge Hemalatha. At the time of the verdict, the Commissioner of Police said, “We are withdrawing the order issued by the Assistant Commissioner of Police and granting permission with conditions.” The judge who recorded it closed the case by ordering the conditional permission to conduct a rath yatra to Madurai by Friday evening.
Click here to subscribe to The Commune on Telegram and get the best stories of the day delivered to you personally.