What'll you do? How long will you keep permitting? Delhi HC asks police on protesters outside UNHCR

New Delhi: Seeking the Delhi Police's stand in the matter, the Delhi High Court on Wednesday asked the police force here what they will do about the protesters outside the UNHCR office in the Capital over delayed asylum procedures. "TIll the UNHCR is there, you will continue permitting? Every time someone will come to court and say please remove them," Justice Rekha Palli observed.

"Tomorrow something else may happen in the world and again this will happen. We have to maintain the law and order in our country or somebody

else will come and do it?" she said while hearing a plea by

residents in the area to remove the protesters.

The high court was hearing a petition filed by the Vasant Vihar Welfare Association, which argued that the protesters were regularly gathering outside the UNHCR office there and sought that a solution be found for this recurring problem.

Justice Palli's strong remarks came after the court was informed that as of the hearing, there were still three protesters outside the UNHCR — even at night time.

While the Delhi Police assured the court that such a situation would not arise again, the high court asked the police to take instructions from the concerned authorities and adjourned the hearing in the matter for four weeks. The court had earlier closed the petition against the Afghan nationals protesting there, after noting that the Delhi government had submitted that they had been removed from the area.

While dealing with the petition earlier, the court had also noted that while it had compassion for the Afghan nationals who had fled their homes for their and their families' safety, it cannot allow them to protest for refugee status in public places amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Ever since the first of the Afghan nationals arrived in Delhi since the Taliban takeover of the homeland, protests have been taking place outside the UNHCR by Afghans who want to seek asylum in other countries. Many of them even lined up outside the Embassies in the Chanakyapuri area for days on end.

When asked why they would rather not stay in India,

many had said that there is not much opportunity for them here. Several protesters also said that their landlords

would throw them out of their homes if they ever found out they were Afghans.