The Bombay High Court bench on July 23 withdrew its oral observations praising the late Father Stan Swamy and even appreciating his work for society.
The bench of Justices Sambhaji Shinde and Nijamoo-din Jamadar withdrew their co-mments after the National In-vestigations Agency (NIA) took strong objection to the “personal comments of the bench.”
The bench was hearing the pending plea of Jesuit Father Swamy by which he had sought interim bail on medical grounds before he died.
On July 23, senior counsel Mihir Desai appearing for Swamy told the judges that he seeks four prayers i.e. to allow Father Frazer Mascarenhas to participate in the Magistrate enquiry in Swamy’s custodial death, to direct the Magistrate to submit its report before the judges and to follow the guidelines of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) on custodial deaths.
The last request that Desai made was that the enquiry should be done by a Magistrate in Mu-mbai. However, the NIA through additional solicitor general Anil Singh opposed the request. The ASG said that the court shouldn’t give directions particularly to follow the NHRC guidelines and also to submit the enquiry report to the bench.
“Moreover, we think that the appeal should be abated as he (Swamy) is no more,” Singh argued.
Countering the submission, Desai pointed out that even if Swamy isn’t here but the HC does have it’s “supervisory po-wers” and thus the appeal cannot be abated.
Aruna Kamat-Pai, the chief public prosecutor for the state said she agreed with the submi-ssions of the ASG over guide-lines, monitoring the enquiry etc. “As far as enquiry in Mumbai is concerned the state will take care of it,” she submitted.