How can perpetrators rein in themselves?

The SC has criticized the state governments of not doing enough to prevent bandhs. How can they do it since they themselves are the perpetrators of these bandhs.

Perhaps the only way Supreme Court or any other court can do is to legally black list the parties or organizations that calls for a bandh and whenever a hearing that pertains to them appears, they get a negative marking which can go against them in the final hearing.

Read the Times of India report here.

The Supreme Court on Thursday slammed state governments for going into an election-year stupor and failing to rescue lakhs of people held hostage by influential groups which frequently block road and rail traffic through violent displays of muscle power.

Venting the commoners' grievance against inaction in dealing with law and order situations, the court said the governments' oft-repeated statements of "stern action" against those who break the law was a mere tool to "fool the people of this country".

‘‘The entire country is going to be ruined,’’ a bench comprising Justices Altamas Kabir and G S Singhvi said, while continuing its sniping at the governments’ unexplained reluctance to act sternly against those who disrupt normal life.

It said the governments were holding back in the fear of antagonizing potential votebanks in an election year even if these groups breached law and order, putting lakhs of common people to inconvenience. And when the courts step in to give people relief, the executive cries "judicial overreach", the judges said.

What started as a critical comment on a local issue — frequent blockades of National Highway 31A, the sole link between Sikkim and the rest of India, by pro- and anti-Gorkhaland agitationists — soon developed into a torrent of criticism from the apex court.

While directing the governments of West Bengal and Sikkim, the Centre and the Gorkhaland agitationists to keep NH-31A open to traffic round the year, the court counted the incidents — regional jingoism in Maharashtra, uprooting of rail tracks and blockade of highways during the Gujjar agitation, blockade of NH-31A and the recent Hyderabad bandh — and said governments have not acted sternly against those who throw normal life out of gear.

Those who were required to act in accordance with the mandate of the Constitution were parties to all these disruptions, the court said, adding: ‘‘Rajasthan faced the music for 45 days. Those who have muscle power can hold everyone to ransom. Whether lakhs of commoners suffer is of least concern to the authorities. It takes just 15 students in a university to bring the entire institution to a stand still. During the Hyderabad bandh, seven persons lost their lives because all supplies, including food and medicines, were hit,’’ it said.