The Supreme Court on Friday extended till August 5 its stay on directives by the Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand governments requiring eateries along the Kanwar Yatra pilgrimage route to display their owners’ names outside the establishments, reported Live Law.

This year’s Kanwar Yatra started on Monday and will conclude on August 6.

The annual pilgrimage is attended by devotees called Kanwariyas, who walk hundreds of kilometres to collect water from the Ganga near Haridwar and carry it back to their home states to offer at temples. They mainly come from Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Delhi and Madhya Pradesh.

On Friday, the court heard pilgrims who supported the Uttar Pradesh government’s directive. The Kanwariyas said that the eateries on their pilgrimage route did not necessarily serve “pure vegetarian” food.

“There are shops with names like Saraswati Dhaba, Ma Durga Dhaba,” one Kanwariya told the court. “We assume it is pure vegetarian. When we enter the shop, the owners and the employees are different, and non-vegetarian food items are served there. It is against my custom and usages.”

The Supreme Court clarified that it had not barred any eatery owner from voluntarily displaying their name outside the establishment.

On Monday, the court had issued an interim stay on the state governments’ directives till Friday. The bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and SVN Bhatti was hearing a batch of petitions contending that the instructions are discriminatory, promote communal discord and threaten livelihoods.

The court had said, however, that the eateries must display information about the type of food they are serving.

In an affidavit filed late on Thursday, the Uttar Pradesh government told the court that the directive was meant to ensure that the religious sentiments of the devotees are not hurt, even accidentally.

The bench noted on Friday that the affidavit had not yet been placed on record and adjourned the matter to August 5.

At Thursday’s hearing, Senior Advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Uttar Pradesh, submitted that under the Central law Food and Safety Standards Act, 2006 require every food seller, including eateries, to display the names of the owners, reported Live Law.

He argued that the court’s stay on the directive was not in line with this law as it was not brought to the bench’s notice by the petitioners. However, the bench said that if there is any such law, then the authorities should be enforcing it throughout the state.

The directives by the Bharatiya Janata Party governments in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand were challenged in the Supreme Court by Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra and the Association of Protection of Civil Rights, while Delhi University professor Apoorvanand Jha and activist Aakar Patel had also jointly filed a similar plea.

The petitioners contended that the directives would facilitate discrimination on the grounds of religion and caste, and that they violate fundamental rights.

The directives applied to the proprietors of dhabas, food stalls and hotels along the pilgrimage route in Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarnagar and Uttarakhand’s Haridwar.

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