A West Bengal government notice had said government employees would have to attend Sunday’s International Yoga Day event on Kolkata’s Red Road, in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Challenging this, an association of government employees went to court. On the application, the Calcutta High Court said on Friday that government employees’ participation in the Yoga Day event was not mandatory.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi took a major role in popularising India’s ancient yoga at home and abroad soon after coming to power. Sunday (21 June) is International Yoga Day. Every year on this day Modi practises yoga in public, and the Indian media give it wide coverage.
After the BJP’s historic win in West Bengal, the state government led by Suvendu Adhikari had planned to close Kolkata’s main thoroughfare, Red Road, for seven days and hold yoga with thousands of people. The government had taken up a vast plan for yoga both on water and on land. For this, a notice had asked the state’s government employees to attend the Yoga Day event.
The Left Front’s government employees’ association went to court challenging the notice. Appearing for the applicants, senior lawyer and former CPIM MP Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya argued that the government could not order people to take part in yoga.
Bikash Ranjan said: “The government cannot order me to do what I do not like to do. This should be optional.” When the court remarked that yoga could be done anywhere, the senior lawyer replied, “I do not want to do it at all.”
Appearing for the state government, Additional Advocate General Bilwadal Bhattacharya told the court that the notice had only encouraged employees to take part in the event. Its main aim, he said, was to set a Guinness World Record for the largest participation at the Red Road yoga event.
Bilwadal said the notice was only a request, and that no action would be taken against those who decided not to take part.
Accepting the state government’s submission, the High Court disposed of the matter. Calcutta High Court Justice Amrita Sinha said in her observation that the government directive was merely a general request to employees to attend the Yoga Day event and was not mandatory, and that no punitive action had been contemplated against anyone unable to attend for personal reasons.
As a result of the court’s decision, the state’s government employees may now skip the yoga event. On social media, however, many described the matter as a major setback for the BJP.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report