"Dissent is the safety valve of democracy and if you don't allow these safety valves, it will burst," said a Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra, also comprising Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud, on the arrests of five civil rights activists -- Varavara Rao, Vernon Gonsalves, Arun Ferreira, Sudha Bhardwaj and Gautam Navalakha.


On August 29, the apex court ordered that Rao, Gonsalves, Ferreira, Bharadwaj and Navlakha be kept under house arrest till September 6.


The action comes after historian Romila Thapar, economist Prabhat Patnaik, social actvist Devaki Jain, sociologist Satish Deshpande and lawyer Maja Daruwala filed a plea against the arrests that were made across the nation on August 28.


Maja Daruwala, Advocate for Civil Liberties, explains to Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf why she and the other eminent petitioners approached the Supreme Court. Read the interview here.