The Supreme Court on Wednesday posted a November 24 hearing on an application filed by climate activist Sonam Wangchuk’s wife Gitanjali Angmo challenging his detention under the National Security Act (NSA) and seeking his release.
A bench comprising Justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria took cognizance of Angma’s amended plea and directed the Center and the Ladakh Union Territory to submit their replies.
“The petitioner was allowed to amend the petition and file the amended copy within a week and the amended opposition must be filed within 10 days thereafter. Reply, if any, within a week thereafter. List on November 24,” the court ordered.
Earlier, the high court had dismissed Wangchuk’s wife’s lawsuit after she sought to file an amended petition with additional grounds challenging Wangchuk’s detention.
Wangchuk’s wife filed a habeas corpus application for her husband’s release on the grounds that the detaining authorities had not provided any reasons for the detention.
In a new application seeking to supplement the grounds for challenging his detention, Angmo refers to a series of actions taken against Wangchuk prior to his arrest, including the cancellation of his NGO’s foreign funding certificate.
A previously filed lawsuit said the family had not been served with reasons for the detention and should have been served.
Wangchuk was detained on September 26 and shifted to Jodhpur Central Jail in Rajasthan for allegedly inciting violent protest in Ladakh. He was placed under the NSA after the Leh violence in which four people were killed and 80 others injured.
The protesters are demanding statehood for Ladakh and inclusion of the region in the sixth schedule of the constitution.
The plea stated that Wangchuk’s detention was not really related to national security or public order, but was intended to silence the respected environmentalist and social reformer for espousing democratic and environmental causes.
According to the petition, the activist only resorted to Gandhi’s peaceful protests in Ladakh, an exercise of his constitutional right to speech and assembly. The detention constitutes a violation of freedom of expression under Article 19, he said.
It said the allegations were “baseless and floated with the sole aim of defaming, maligning and discrediting his peaceful Gandhian movement” aimed at protecting Ladakh’s ecology.
The lawsuit alleged that a “systematic campaign” was “unleashed” against Wangchuk based on “connections with Pakistan and China.”
“In particular, a blasphemous story suggesting links with Pakistan and China has been deliberately floated in certain areas with the sole objective of defaming, maligning and discrediting the peaceful Gandhian movement for the protection of Ladakh, its fragile ecology, its mountains, glaciers and the livelihood of its people,” the plea said.
Angmo also questioned Wangchuk’s transfer to the central jail in Jodhpur, more than a thousand kilometers from Ladakh, the site of the protests.
