Gujarat HC Denies Urgent Hearing On Plea Seeking To Ensure No Communal Disharmony Occurs During Dhirendra Shastri Events

The Gujarat High Court on Wednesday denied urgent hearing on a PIL seeking directions to the police to ensure that no activity inciting communal disharmony occurs during the upcoming events of self-styled godman Dhirendra Shastri.

Shastri is the chief of Bageshwar Dham in Chhatarpur district of Madhya Pradesh.

A single-judge Justice S V Pinto denied the petitioner’s request for an urgent hearing on the grounds that the self-styled godman’s ‘Divya Darbar’ events were set to begin on May 26, 2023.

Petitioner advocate KR Koshty informed the bench that Shastri’s ‘Divya Darbars’ is scheduled between May 26 and June 7 in four Gujarat cities: Surat, Ahmedabad, Vadodara, and Rajkot.

He asked the court to order that speakers at the proposed events refrain from using inflammatory and intimidating language that could incite ”communal disharmony through hate speeches.” The petitioner claimed that the state government had failed to follow Apex Court orders in the Tahseen Poonawalla case, which outlined prevention and remedial measures.

Shastri has been booked in a case of alleged hate speech in Udaipur, Rajasthan, and similar demands were made following his programs in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Bihar, according to the petitioner, who added that representations made to the respondents (police and other government authorities) have so far yielded no response in this regard.