New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Monday questioned the Delhi Police as to how two different units of their force had filed separate chargesheets against the same people for the same offences in the Tablighi Jamaat cases — while also asking the concerned DCP to respond to whether there was any prohibition on Indian nationals offering shelter to foreign nationals who were here with a valid passport and visa. Justice Mukta Gupta was hearing a bunch of pleas by Indian nationals against whom FIRs were registered and charges filed for sheltering Tablighi Jamaat attendees after a Covid-19 cluster was discovered in the Nizamuddin Markaz.
"When suddenly lockdown was imposed, people were static wherever they were. You have to find out, once lockdown was imposed, whereafter the persons were moving here and there and that they had visited these places even when there was prohibition," the court told the APP representing Delhi Police, according to legal news website LiveLaw.
At the outset, Advocate Ashima Mandla, for the petitioners, said that the Crime Branch had chargesheeted her clients but that they were also charged in another FIR. Justice Mukta asked whether two units of the Delhi Police would be filing two chargesheets. "That's permissible you want to say?" When the Delhi Police counsel said he was not concerned with the Crime Branch FIR, Justice Gupta said, "What do you mean you are not concerned? Can a person for the same offences be chargesheeted twice?It doesn't work like this, filing half-baked things before the Court."
The court went on to say that there was no investigation conducted in the case. Mandla put forth that from the beginning, the police have not acted in good faith — pointing out that after the cluster was discovered, they had to approach the court with a habeas corpus for the police to reveal where they were being held. At that point, the police said they were kept in quarantine but can't be let off because there were cases against them. She went on to say that the police filed 48 chargesheets and 11 supplementary chargesheets in three days against over 900 people. While a majority took plea bargains — all 44 who chose trial were either acquitted or discharged of all offences.
She argued, "The allegation today is that I, being an Indian national, have housed foreign nationals — that is my offence."
Accordingly, the court called for an affidavit from the DCP in the area — directing them to indicate whether the petitioners had, in fact, been charged in the second FIR as well and whether there was any bar on Indian nationals housing foreign national who were in the country with a valid passport and visa. The court will now hear the matter next on January 4.