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New Delhi, Feb 17: The Supreme Court said on Monday that people have a fundamental right to protest against a law but the blocking of public roads is a matter of concern and there has to be a balancing factor.

Hearing pleas over the road blocks due to the ongoing protests at Shaheen Bagh against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), a bench comprising Justices S K Kaul and K M Joseph said its concern is about what will happen if people start protesting on roads.

Democracy works on expressing views but there are lines and boundaries for it, the bench said.

It asked senior advocate Sanjay Hegde and advocate Sadhana Ramachandran to talk to Shaheen Bagh protestors and persuade them to move to an alternative site where no public place is blocked.

The matter has been posted for next hearing on February 24.

People have a fundamental right to protest but the thing which is troubling us is the blocking of public roads, the bench said.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said Shaheen Bagh protestors should not be given a message that every institution is on its knees trying to persuade them on this issue.

The apex court said that if nothing works, we will leave it to the authorities to deal with the situation.

Protestors have made their made their point and the protests have gone on for quite some time, it said.

Restrictions have been imposed on the Kalindi Kunj-Shaheen Bagh stretch and the Okhla underpass, which were closed on December 15 last year due to the protests against CAA and Register of Citizens.

The top court had earlier said the anti-CAA protesters at Delhi's Shaheen Bagh cannot block public roads and create inconvenience for others.

The apex court was hearing an appeal filed by advocate Amit Sahni, who had approached the Delhi high court seeking directions to the Delhi Police to ensure smooth traffic flow on the Kalindi Kunj-Shaheen Bagh stretch, which was blocked by anti-CAA protesters on December 15.

While dealing with Sahni's plea, the high court had asked local authorities to deal with the situation keeping in mind law and order.

Separately, former BJP MLA Nand Kishore Garg has filed a petition in the apex court seeking directions to the authorities to remove the protestors from Shaheen Bagh.

One of the pleas has sought laying down of comprehensive and exhaustive guidelines relating to outright restrictions for holding protests or agitations leading to obstruction of public place.

In his plea, Garg has said that law enforcement machinery was being "held hostage to the whims and fancies of the protesters" who have blocked vehicular and pedestrian movement from the road connecting Delhi to Noida.

State has the duty to protect fundamental rights of citizen who were continuously being harassed by the blockage of arterial road, it said.

"It is disappointing that the state machinery is muted and a silent spectator to hooliganism and vandalism of the protesters who are threatening the existential efficacy of the democracy and the rule of law and had already taken the law and order situation in their own hand," the plea had said.

In his appeal, Sahni had sought supervision of the situation in Shaheen Bagh, where several women are sitting on protest, by a retired Supreme Court judge or a sitting judge of the Delhi High Court.

Sahni has said in his plea that protests in Shaheen Bagh has inspired similar demonstrations in other cities and to allow it to continue would set a wrong precedent.

Mumbai, Mar 27: The RBI on Friday put on hold EMI payments on all term loans for three months and cut interest rate by steepest in more than 11 years as it joined the government effort to rescue a slowing economy that has now got caught in coronavirus whirlwind.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) cut repo to 4.4 per cent, the lowest in at least 15 years. Also, it reduced the cash reserve ratio maintained by the banks for the first time in over seven years. CRR for all banks was cut by 100 basis points to release Rs 1.37 lakh crore across banking system.

The reverse repo rate was cut by 90 bps to 4 per cent, creating an asymmetrical corridor.

RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das predicted a big global recession and said India will not be immune.

It all depends how India responds to the situation, he said.

Global slowdown could make things difficult for India too, despite some help from falling crude prices, Das said, adding food prices may soften even further on record crop production.

Aggregate demand may weaken and ease core inflation further, he noted.

The liquidity measures announced include auction of targeted long-term repo operation of 3 year tenor for total amount of Rs 1 lakh crore at floating rate and accommodation under Marginal Standing Facility to be increased from 2 per cent to 3 per cent of Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR) with immediate effect till June 30.

Combined, these three measures will make available a total Rs 3,74,000 crore to the country's financial system.

After cutting policy rates five times in 2019, the RBI had been on a pause since December in view of high inflation.

The measures announced come a day after the government unveiled a Rs 1.7 lakh crore package of free foodgrains and cash doles to the poor to deal with the economic impact of the unprecedented 21-day nationwide lockdown.

While the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the RBI originally was slated to meet in the first week of April, it was advanced by a week to meet the challenge of coronavirus.

New Delhi, Jun 2: India on Tuesday reported 8,171 more COVID-19 cases and 204 deaths in the last 24 hours as the country's virus count inches closer to two lakh, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

The total number of cases in the country now stands at 1,98,706 including 97,581 active cases, 95,527 cured/discharged/migrated and 5,598 deaths.

Cases in Maharashtra have crossed 70,000 including over 30,000 recovered while Tamil Nadu's COVID-19 tally jumped to 23,495.