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AJL moves Supreme Court against HC order to vacate premises
The National Herald’s publisher, Associated Journals Limited (AJL), on Monday moved the Supreme Court against a Delhi high court order that upheld the Centre’s directive to the newspaper to vacate its premises in the national capital.
The National Herald’s publisher, Associated Journals Limited (AJL), on Monday moved the Supreme Court against a Delhi high court order that upheld the Centre’s directive to the newspaper to vacate its premises in the national capital.
AJL has alleged the directive was part of “a political witch-hunt” due to the government’s “pathological hatred” for “Nehruvian ideals” and to “scuttle” the dissenting voices to create a “majoritarian state.”
The country’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, founded the National Herald newspaper in 1938. The AJL said the mala fide intent behind the eviction order was “writ large even by a bare perusal of the tweets” by the members of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, uploaded before the eviction order was communicated to AJL in October 2018.
“The eviction proceedings constitute a malicious step in the larger design of defaming and effacing the legacy of Pandit Nehru,” said the AJL’s plea.
The eviction proceedings have been initiated for the purposes of scuttling the voice of democratic dissent of the Congress, AJL said.
The Delhi high court on February 28 dismissed AJL’s plea against the eviction orders. The AJL was directed to vacate the premises over alleged violation of a lease agreement.
Attacking the Congress following the high court’s decision on December 21 to reject Congress’s plea challenging the eviction, BJP said the matter was a “textbook case” of corruption. “In the Narendra Modi government, the Congress will not be allowed to loot the country,” Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had said.
