The Supreme Court on Wednesday granted permission for a Christian community prayer to be held as scheduled today at Indore in Madhya Pradesh [Suresh Carletons vs State of Madhya Pradesh and ors].

A bench of Justices BR Gavai, Satish Chandra Sharma and Sandeep Mehta set aside the orders of the Madhya Pradesh High Court and the district administration in this regard.

An Indore assistant election officer had recently cancelled permission for the event citing law and order issues. The same was upheld by the High Court which led to the appeal before the top court.

According to PTI, Chennai-based Christian preacher Dr. Paul Dhinakaran is slated to be the keynote speaker at the meeting.

The Indore administration had stated that there is opposition to the event from Hindu outfits and other social organisations, who had filed complaints at the Tukoganj Police Station.

Suresh Carletons (petitioner), who is the Christian Hospital Indore administrator and the chairperson of the prayer meet’s organising committee, then moved the Indore Bench of the High Court against the district administration’s last-minute decision.

The High Court dismissed the plea stating,

“This court is of the considered opinion that it might be true that the intention of the petitioner to convene such meeting must be purely religious in nature, however, the concern raised by the respondents can also not be said to be unfounded.”

The Supreme Court allowed the appeal against the same.

Senior Counsel Santosh Paul and advocates Lija Merin John, Sanbha Rumnong, Aakarsh Kamra and Ajay Shaw represented the petitioner.