CHENNAI: A specially constituted bench of the Madras High Court on Sunday directed the government to file a status report with regard to the maintenance of law and order situation in the State from Saturday.
The special bench of justices S Vaidyanathan and R Mahadevan gave the direction while admitting two public interest writ petition praying for a direction to the chief secretary and home secretary to take appropriate steps to ensure public order, safety and public tranquility, pursuant to the pronouncement of the judgment against former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa by a special court in Bangalore on Saturday.
In his petition, advocate S Jimraj Milton, secretary of Human Rights Protection Centre, raised two issues. While one related to the constitutional vacuum that arose because of the judgment, the second was with regard to maintenance of law and order in the State.
He submitted that the judgment has created a constitutional vacuum now, as there was no Chief Minister and Council of Ministers (at the time of filing), on whose advice the Governor had to act.
The second one was the law and order situation. Advocate-General AL Somayaji submitted that there were only some agitations. One bus was set ablaze in Kancheepuram.
Seven persons were arrested in this connection. In another incident, a two-wheeler was torched in Dharapuram and six persons were arrested. Totally, 13 cases were registered. However, there was no casualty.
A meeting was already held between the chief secretary and Director General of Police and they chalked out the plan to bring the situation under control. Already 38 companies of police force were deployed throughout the State. One inspector general of police and four superintendents of police were sent to various districts to assist the local police, the AG said.
Except the agitations that erupted in emotion, no other violent incidents took place, he claimed. By 6 pm on Saturday, even those agitations were brought under control and now the situation is fully under control, he added. The other Public Interest Litigation was filed by social activist KR Ramaswamy.