Jamia Teachers Solidarity Association terms the judgement given by a bench of Supreme Court judges dismissing the plea for ordering a judicial enquiry in Batla House encounter case as highly unfortunate. The bench’s main argument—that, any enquiry would cause “unnecessary harassment of the police†and “adversely affect the morale of the police†—is astoundingly irrelevant to the merit of the case. One fails to understand how an enquiry would amount to harassment of the police as hundreds, if not thousands, of enquiries are in progress against the police at any given moment. The judges when responding to the petitioner’s argument that large sections of society have doubts on the role of the police said: “Criminals are criminals. Don’t identify them with any section of the society.†How come the honourable judges have already made up their minds about the accused when they have been not subjected to any trial or fair enquiry—does not labelling them “criminals†in the absence of any enquiry militate against the very basic tenets of law and principles of natural justice?