New Delhi:
The viral video of a lady holding her books shut and operating away as a bulldozer razes shanties got here up within the Supreme Court docket right this moment because the bench blasted the Uttar Pradesh authorities and the Prayagraj administration, pulling them for a 2020 demolition drive.
“There’s a viral video the place a small lady might be seen outdoors a demolished home. Everybody could be very disturbed by such visuals,” Justice Ujjal Bhuyan mentioned because the courtroom got here down closely towards the authorities, calling the bulldozer motion “inhuman” and ordering Rs 10 lakh compensation to every home-owner who approached the courtroom.
The bench of Justice AS Oka and Justice Bhuyan slammed the Uttar Pradesh authorities for razing the houses of a lawyer, a professor and a few others with out following due process. Advocate Zulfiqar Haider, Professor Ali Ahmed and three others had advised the courtroom that they got notices only one evening earlier than the bulldozer motion.
The lawyer representing the petitioners had advised the courtroom that the authorities mistakenly recognized the land on which their houses had been constructed as belonging to gangster Atiq Ahmed, who was murdered in 2023.
The courtroom additionally pulled up the authorities for the style by which the demolition notices had been served. Whereas the State counsel mentioned the notices had been affixed on the properties, the courtroom questioned why the notices weren’t despatched by registered publish.
“These circumstances shock our conscience. Residential premises of the appellants have been excessive handedly demolished in matter which now we have mentioned intimately,” the courtroom mentioned in its order.
The viral video the courtroom referred to is from Ambedkar Nagar district in Uttar Pradesh. Throughout a demolition motion in Jalalpur, the lady was seen operating away from her shanty, clutching her books shut.
The video was extensively shared, with Opposition leaders focusing on the Yogi Adityanath authorities for its bulldozer actions, which have additionally come beneath criticism from the Supreme Court docket.
Akhilesh Yadav, Lok Sabha MP and chief of Uttar Pradesh’s Samajwadi Occasion, had focused the state authorities over the viral video. “In Ambedkar Nagar, a authorities official is demolishing individuals’s houses to claim his authority, forcing a younger lady to run to save lots of her books. These are the identical BJP leaders who say Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao,” he mentioned.
उप्र के अम्बेडकर नगर में एक प्रशासनिक अधिकारी अपनी शान दिखाने के लिए लोगों की झोपड़ियां गिरा रहा है और एक बच्ची अपनी किताबें बचाने के लिए भागने पर मजबूर है। ये वही भाजपाई लोग हैं, जो कहते हैं : बेटी बचाओ, बेटी पढ़ाओ! pic.twitter.com/eSTJKvZZKD
— Akhilesh Yadav (@yadavakhilesh) March 22, 2025
The Uttar Pradesh Congress had additionally shared the video on X and fired an assault on the Yogi Adityanath authorities. “From the shanty being razed by the bulldozer, slightly lady saved her most treasured possession — books! This video is a shame to these in energy who snatch books from kids’s palms and the roof over their heads,” it mentioned.
Ambedkar Nagar Police had, nonetheless, defended the demolition drive and mentioned a number of notices had been issued to residents. “This motion was taken to take away encroachment from the village land, following an ejection order (case quantity T202404040205504) handed by the Jalalpur tehsildar’s courtroom. A number of notices had been issued earlier than clearing the non-residential buildings. The demolition was carried out in full compliance with the income courtroom’s order to reclaim authorities land,” they mentioned, in keeping with a PTI report.
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