Police silent on securing religious sites apart from churches: Centre tells Delhi HC

New Delhi: The Centre on Wednesday told Delhi High Court that while the city police has taken steps to ensure safety of churches and institutes run by missionaries, it was “silent” on the issue of protecting other religious places like temples, mosques and gurudwaras. [caption id=“attachment_2321998” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Centre told the Delhi HC that the police was silent on securing religious sites apart from churches. Reuters[/caption] The submission was made by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) before a bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Jayant Nath which was hearing a PIL, filed in the wake of attacks on churches in the national capital, seeking protection of religious rights of Christians. Central government standing counsel Anil Soni, appearing for MHA, referred to a joint affidavit filed by Delhi Police and the ministry and said the document was “silent” on what has been done to secure other religious sites. Soni said that according to police, last year there were “106 incidents relating to the trespass, theft, vandalism or destruction at temples, two cases in relation to mosques and 10 in connection with gurudwaras”, whereas there were only five attacks on churches in the same period. The bench, thereafter, directed Delhi Police to file a status report in four weeks on what steps it has taken to protect other religious sites and listed the matter for further hearing on 26 August. In the joint affidavit, the police had said that every church and minority-run schools and educational institutes have been provided round the clock security through “dedicated deployment”. “It is being ensured that PCR vans, emergency response vehicle and motorcycle patrol around churches/missionary schools for enhanced security. At all vulnerable locations, static deployment is made during night hours,” the ministry had said in the joint report. The affidavit had been filed in the PIL by advocate Reegan S Bell who had also sought a status report from the Centre, Delhi government and police on action taken by them regarding the attacks and efforts made by them to secure these places against such incidents in future. On 24 April, a single judge bench of the high court while referring the matter to the bench headed by Chief Justice G Rohini had observed that “whether it’s a church, temple, gurudwara, mosque, we have to make sure all religious places are equally saved”. The plea had said that since last December, five churches in Delhi have been vandalised but till date no arrests have been made except in one case, while no case have been solved yet. The government has failed to prevent such attacks, it had alleged. The Delhi Police rejected the petitioner’s claim, saying “by carrying out physical visit to each police station in Delhi, the data related to incidents reported in church premises in last five years was gathered”. “As per the report, there are nine cases reported in Delhi which are related to incident (which) occurred in church premises in the last five years. Interrogation of accused persons arrested in these cases has already been done during the course of investigation of this cases. But (there is) no clue so far,” it had said in the affidavit. “Local traditional sources have also been deployed to collect information about the criminals involved in this incident. The services of special staff of the district are also being utilised,” the affidavit had said. It had also said that there are 240 churches and 91 Christian-run schools in Delhi. “The DCP and police station staff have also been directed to make surprise visit to the churches/Christian missionary schools. “The directors and management of these institutions have been requested to install CCTV cameras and deploy guards for safety and security of these places. At present, 161 churches and 69 schools have installed CCTV cameras and 15 schools have got installed cameras on the insistence of police,” it had said. PTI