Allahabad: A bench of Justices Mahesh Chandra Tripathi and Prashant Kumar of the Allahabad High Court recused itself from hearing the appeal filed by journalist Mohammed Zubair, co-founder of Alt News, to drop the case against him for allegedly inciting religious animosity.
He was arrested by the Ghaziabad police on a complaint by Udita Tyagi, general secretary of the Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati Trust, under Section 152 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), which criminalises acts endangering the sovereignty, unity, and integrity of India.
In the second post in the thread, Zubair wrote, “For people supporting Yati Narsinghanand. Here is a video of Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati Maharaj’s vile comments about women in politics, especially BJP women leaders in politics (2021).”
In addition to this tweet, Zubair shared a video of Yati disparaging female politicians. The thread additionally showed another video from 2022 in which Yati Narsinghanand made derogatory statements about Prithviraj Chavan, the News Minute reported.
While Zubair was highlighting Yati's controversial statements, Udita Tyagi said that the old video recordings were shared with the objective of inciting Muslims to violence. Initially, he was booked under BNS sections 196 (promoting enmity between groups on religious grounds), 228 (fabricating false evidence), 299 (outraging religious feelings), 356(3) (defamation), and 351(2) (criminal intimidation).
Zubair proceeded to the High Court to challenge the FIR and seek protection from detention. The High Court ordered the investigating officer to provide an affidavit detailing the charges levelled against Zubair.
On November 27, the IO stated to the court that sections 66 (computer-related offences) of the Information Technology Act and 152 (Act endangering the sovereignty, unity, and integrity of India) of the BNS had been added to the case.
Zubair claimed that his post was created with the objective of informing authorities about Narsinghanand's statements and asking for legal action. He contended that it cannot be understood as encouraging conflict or violence.
He further stated that posting publicly available videos of Narsinghanand's comments does not qualify as defamation. Zubair further claimed that the FIR was a malicious attempt to suppress him for disclosing Yati Narsinghanand's suspected criminal activities.