In the first of two cases, Metropolitan Magistrate Tarun Kumar Sehrawat ordered an MLA named in a case of trespassing to organise a cleanliness drive and also spread awareness about family planning and AIDS. In the second order, Metropolitan Magistrate Gautam Mannan ordered a boy accused of causing an accident by jumping a red light and driving without a licence, to attend 10 days in a traffic school.

In the first case, an FIR under Sections 451 and 427 of the IPC was filed in 1998 against Gyas Ahmed on the complaint of Rekha Bhalla, in the Hazrat Nizamuddin police station. The complainant had then named the Jangpura MLA, T S Marwah, as one of the people who had incited Gyas Ansari to enter her house. Later, the accused and the complainant reached a compromise. However, the metropolitan magistrate felt that since the entire judicial machinery had been pressed into service, “the applicants have a moral responsibility to pay back to society in kind by way of social service.”

The magistrate ordered the applicants to organise a cleanliness drive and a family planning programme, including a campaign on HIV/AIDS. While Marwah agreed to hold the drive in Basti Barapulla on Sunday, the court asked the SHO of the area to file a compliance report.

In the second case, 20-year-old Tarun was accused of hitting a scooter at a red light. According to the prosecution, he did not have a driver’s licence either. A case was registered in the Naraina police station. However, Tarun asked for leniency on grounds of young age. And in his order, metropolitan magistrate Gautam Mannan wrote, “keeping in view the young age and the fact that he (accused) had no criminal record, a lenient view is taken.”