Court appoints special officers for Amit Shah's Kolkata rally

The Calcutta High Court Friday appointed two special officers from the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) and West Bengal Fire Services Department for ensuring compliances of rules for BJP national president Amit Shah's proposed Nov 30 Kolkata rally.

Denied permission to hold the rally at Victoria House, where the ruling Trinamool Congress usually organises its annual martyrs' day rally, the Bharatiya Janata Party's state unit had moved the bench of Justice Debangshu Basak alleging discrimination by the administration.

The special officers - director general of state fire services and KMC joint commissioner (development) - would be assisted by a senior officer of Kolkata police and will meet at 10.30 am Saturday to fix the conditions for holding the proposed public meeting.

Hearing the petition, Justice Basak observed that this is the first attempt by a political party to comply with fire and municipal body regulations to hold a public meeting and as such, they must be "given some leeway".

Both the KMC and the fire department Thursday had denied permission for the rally following which the BJP Friday again moved the bench of Justice Basak.

Claiming that the court has given the green signal for the rally, BJP national secretary Siddarth Nath Singh said the judgment was a "rap on the knuckles for the anarchist style of Mamata Banerjee government".

"It is a historical judgment as it paves the way for equality to be maintained by local administrations for all political parties and not to be influenced by their political masters. It is a rap on the anarchist style of Mamata Banerjee government which had tried to stop the rally," said Singh also the party's observer for the state.

Christened as 'Uththan Diwas' (Day of Rising), Shah is scheduled to kick off the party campaign for the 2015 KMC elections and the 2016 assembly polls from the venue.