Karnataka High Court Directs Penal Action Against Participants Of Public Rally For Not Wearing Facemasks

The Karnataka High Court on Wednesday directed the State Government to ensure that penal and other actions are initiated in accordance with law against those persons who attended rallies held on March 23 violating COVID-19 norms regarding social distancing and wearing of face masks.

Advocate G R Mohan appearing for one of the petitioner today filed a memo before the court drawing its attention to pictures of two events—one is a film promotion event being attended by Actor Puneeth Rajkumar and other is a political rally organized by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which was attended by the Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa.

A division bench of Chief Justice Abhay Oka and Justice Suraj Govindaraj on going through the memo said "It appears from the photographs that a large number of persons participated in the rallies and many were not wearing face masks. He pointed out that on March 23, a total of 1280 positive cases were reported."

It added "We direct the state govt to look into the pictures produced along with the memo and ensure that penal and other action is initiated in accordance with law."

The court also directed BJP who is respondent no 5 to the petition filed by Letzkit foundation to also respond to the memo filed by Mohan.

During the hearing, Advocate Vikram Huilgol, appearing for the state government, filed two memos. First one stated that a notification is issued by the state government on March 24, by which it has notified authorised officers and amount payable for compounding of offences committed under the Karnataka Epidemic Diseases Act, 2020.

The notification states: General public who violates the regulations/guidelines regarding compulsory wearing of masks and maintaining social distance (regulation 2), the compounding amount in BBMP Area shall be Rs 250 and in municipal corporation areas it will be Rs 250. The offence can be compounded by a BBMP marshal, a police official not below the rank of head constable, health inspectors of corporations and bill collectors of the municipal corporations. In areas other than municipal corporation the compounding amount is Rs 100.

The state government also informed the court that on Tuesday, a First Information Report has been filed against the organizer of the Panchamashali rally held on February 21.

Earlier, the court had taken exception to the action of the state government in not registering FIR against the participants who were not wearing masks.

The court had said ""Lakhs of people assembled without masks and you are not registering FIR. This is something which is unpardonable. Initially we kept granting you time as you said law is being amended. Now the law is amended and there is no compounding and still you are saying we will not register an FIR. Unless there is an offence it cannot be compounded. As a matter of Law you must first register FIR and then do compounding, law permits you to do compounding you do compounding no difficulty about that."

Today the bench said "Concerned officer shall ensure that the same is taken to its logical conclusion." It directed the state government "to place on record a report of investigation in crime no 25/2021, containing details of investigation so far carried out. The report has to be submitted in a sealed cover."

The court also directed the State government to give adequate publicity to the notification issued by it on March 24, for informing the members of the public.

The matter will be heard next on April 8.