An emergency Sunday hearing of the Supreme Court has exposed how far the policing of recent Delhi protests strayed from constitutional limits. Reporters from at least nine outlets were detained on 10 October and seven more on 11 October, with phones seized and footage deleted - a pattern that, alongside a reported mobile internet shutdown and thousands of detentions, prompted judges to intervene directly.
What the Court found
The bench of Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V. Mohana, hearing Shailendra Mani Tripathi v. Govind Mohan alongside a connected habeas corpus petition, found that petitioners had made out a prima facie case. It issued notice to the alleged contemnors and demanded a counter affidavit and compliance report by 13 October 2026. Among its directions, recorded at paragraph 16(c), was an unqualified order: internet facilities should function unhindered. The Court also barred illegal detention and directed that journalists, lawyers and other professionals not be obstructed in their work - a baseline protection that should never have required judicial intervention to secure.
A shutdown without a paper trail
Mobile internet was reportedly suspended for twenty-four hours across a four-kilometre radius in central Delhi from 10 pm on 9 October, while counsel told the Court that roughly 7,000 people had been illegally detained in the city. The Union's response was an oral assurance that services had since been restored. That is not how internet suspensions are supposed to work. Under Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India and the Telecommunications (Temporary Suspension of Services) Rules, 2024, any such order must be published, must record reasons, and must be proportionate and time-limited. None of that happened here. Restoring access after the fact, without disclosing why it was cut in the first place, sidesteps the entire framework built to prevent arbitrary shutdowns - and leaves citizens unable to challenge an order they were never shown.
Why this matters beyond Delhi
Internet shutdowns have become a recurring instrument of crowd control in India, typically justified on public order grounds but rarely subjected to the transparency the law demands. Seizing journalists' phones and deleting footage compounds the problem: it erases the evidentiary record that would otherwise let courts, oversight bodies and the public assess whether force was proportionate. Article 144 of the Constitution binds all authorities, civil and judicial, to act in aid of the Supreme Court's orders - yet the Internet Freedom Foundation notes that breaches of protester safety continued even after the ruling, raising real doubts about compliance by the Union Government and Delhi Police.
What accountability should look like now
- Full compliance with the Court's order: no suspension, throttling or jamming of internet services in Delhi.
- Publication of every suspension order from 9 and 10 October, including recorded reasons and the Review Committee's findings.
- An end to illegal detentions, with protesters' safety guaranteed and journalists and lawyers free to work.
- Return of seized phones and public disclosure of seizure records.
The freedoms of speech and peaceful assembly under Article 19, and the guarantee of personal liberty under Article 21, extend to every person in Delhi - including those on the streets protesting. A court order compelling the state to honour that baseline is a necessary corrective, but it is also a sign of how much ground has already been lost.