Rights activist and Chair of Amnesty International India Board Aakar Patel, who was stopped from leaving the country, asked a Delhi court to “send a suitable reply” by asking the CBI investigating officer to reimburse his flight tickets to the USA.
Patel was due to travel to the US from the Bangalore International Airport on Wednesday when he was stopped by the immigration authorities on the ground who informed him that a lookout circular (LOC) was issued against him in connection with a case against Amnesty India in 2019 when he had headed the organisation.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Pawan Kumar will pronounce his order at 4 pm.
Patel’s lawyer Tanveer Ahmed Mir told the magistrate that “citizens rights cannot be railroaded by law enforcement agency” and the best mechanism is to make the investigating officer (IO) Himanshu Bahuguna, who promulgates the LOC to “pay the money that I have lost directly from his pocket.”
“Why would I leave India and do what I chose to do. What the IO has done is put me to a prejudice of Rs 3,80,000 (cost of Patel’s flight tickets). It is time that we send a suitable reply to law enforcement agencies and society. If he is not able to sustain this exercise, the IO pay an amount of Rs 3,80,000 that is the least he owes me,” Mir told the court.
Mir also suggested that the amount may be given to many institutions like the Delhi Police widows fund or the Delhi High Court mediation centre while stressing “On first…
