HC dismisses PILs against Kejriwal's sit-in at L-G office

The Delhi High Court today dismissed a batch of PILs against Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's sit-in protest at the Lieutenant Governor's office and the alleged absence of IAS officers in routine meetings of the Delhi administration, saying as the strike has been called off nothing remained in the matters.

Kejriwal had on June 19 called off his nine-day-long sit-in at Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal's office after the bureaucrats had started to attend meetings with the ministers.

A bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice C Hari Shankar said the "cause of action" for the petitions was the sit-in protest which has already been called off.

"Right to strike exists. The strike has been called off. You (petitioners) want us to decide an academic question in a PIL. The strike is over, so the cause of action for all these matters is over.

"We are not inclined to entertain these matters," the bench said and dismissed all the PILs, one of them by Leader of Opposition in Delhi Assembly Vijender Gupta.

Kejriwal and some of his cabinet colleagues -- Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and Health Minister Satyender Jain -- had staged a sit-in at the L-G's office from June 11 to June 19 to press for their demands, including a direction to IAS officers to end their "strike" and action against those who have struck work.