‘Abuse of process of law’: Bombay HC rejects PIL seeking recovery of costs for Z-plus security from RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat

The PIL sought directions to the respondent authorities to forthwith recover the security charges from the RSS. It also sought directions to the authorities to decide representations made by the petitioner regarding the issue earlier this year.

Advocate A R Ingole, appearing for the petitioner, referred to a 2023 Supreme Court judgment in Union of India Vs. Bikash Saha case and argued that Z+ security cover provided to any person must have a reasonable basis of security threat to that person. The plea also claimed that public money cannot be wasted on the expenses incurred for providing security cover to an organisation like the RSS.

Devendra V Chauhan, Government Pleader, representing the state government, opposed the PIL.

“We do not find any public interest involved in this writ petition marked as PIL. The petitioner does not disclose the source of information,” the high court noted.

The bench also observed that the petitioner “does not state that he conducted sufficient research as required under the relevant rules and seems to have rushed to the court on the basis of a newspaper report”.

“Quite apparently, this Public Interest Litigation is a motivated petition and amounts to an abuse of the process of law,” the high court noted while disposing of the plea.

In 2022, Singh had moved another writ petition for allegedly being summoned by the police to record his statement after he filed a query under the Right to Information (RTI) Act related to the security provided to the RSS.

In April 2023, the government lawyer had assured that there would be no further action by the police department on the basis of notice issued to Singh, after which the high court had disposed of the plea concerned.