CALCUTTA, INDIA, October 9, 2016 (Indian Express): The Calcutta High Court has held the time limits set by the West Bengal government for Durga statue immersion next week, on account of the Muslim observance of Moharram, as “arbitrary” and said the order was a “clear endeavor” by the state to “appease the minority section of the public.” While noting that “we live in difficult times” and it would be “dangerous to mix politics with religion,” the order of October 6 by a single-member bench of Justice Dipankar Dutta said no decision should be taken that could pit “one community against another,” and that “intolerance would rise in the event of such arbitrary decision” of the government.
Bijoy Dashami, the day of the Durga statue immersion, falls on October 11 this year. The tazia procession for Muharram is to take place the next day. Directing the police and civil administration to work together to identify routes for the immersion processions and for the tazia to be taken out by the Muslim community, taking care to “ensure that the routes do not overlap”, Justice Dutta said that “no effort” had been made to “satisfy” the Bench that “processions (tazia) on the eve of Moharram are an inseparable part of the mourning” associated with Moharram.
The order further said that Bijoy Dashami is a ritual for “puritan Hindus,” that can’t be “postponed to a day” beyond Bijoy Dashami, or “preponed at the whims” of the state government. Justice Dutta felt that apart from the fact that the restrictions on statue immersion were “unprecedented” in Bengal’s history, there is “no decision in black and white taken either by the civil administration or by the police administration indicating any reason for imposing the impugned restriction.”