The Goalpara Deputy Commissioner of Assam issued orders to SP Police Goalpara to submit the report in connection with financial damages to public and personal properties during the bandh called by AASU & KMSS.
Which means the process has started to recover the cost from the AASU and KMSS for a bandh called in the month of February.
The development came to light when the Legal Rights Observatory( LRO )had shot letters to all DCs of Assam to recover damages from those groups appealing for bandh as per directives of Supreme Court of India as well as Guwahati High Court.
This is the first order of this sort in Assam which witnesses dozens of Bandhs annually for one reason or another. (See the order below).
This is noteworthy that Gauhati High Court has once again banned bandhs and road or rail blockades in Assam and directed the police to lodge FIRs against organisations that call and enforce these.
A bench of Justice Ujjal Bhuyan on last Tuesday made a series of instructions taking the anti bandh measure implementation on its own hand after failing to impress successive state government to take action.
The court order said "In case of a district bandh or a bandh covering more than one district or a local bandh or a blockade of either road or rail of similar nature, the jurisdictional superintendent of police shall lodge the first information at the competent police station within 24 hours and inform the commissioner and secretary of home and political department within three to seven days."
"Investigating officers in all such cases shall carry out investigation expeditiously and file charge sheets before the competent criminal court promptly so that the offenders can be tried in a fast-track mode," it added.
The court asked the Assam Police Accountability Commission to monitor filing of first information and registration of cases and take appropriate action in case of any default or non-seriousness in complying with the court directions.
The commission will also have to submit a monitoring report to the registrar (judicial) of the high court once every three months.
The Gauhati High Court also ordered the commissioner and secretary of home and political department to file contempt petition(s) against the organisers and the main office-bearers of such organisations calling bandhs/blockades before the high court.
The court said loss caused to the state on account of bandh/blockade shall be recovered from the organisers and main office-bearers of the organisations enforcing bandh/blockade.
