The Delhi Sessions Court has granted bail to journalist Mohammed Zubair who was arrested on June 27 for a 2018 tweet that allegedly hurt religious sentiments and promoted enmity.
The Delhi Police arrested Zubair under Sections 153A and 295 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for tweeting a “questionable image with a purpose to deliberately insult the god of a particular religion.” The tweet contained an image of a hotel’s name being altered from “Honeymoon Hotel” to “Hanuman Hotel” after the Hindu god Hanuman. The use of this image and the words “Before 2014 and after 2014” allegedly targeted the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who had come to power in 2014.
Subsequently the Delhi Police filed additional charges of criminal conspiracy, evidence destruction, and deliberately outraging religious feelings under Sections 120B, 201, and 295A of the IPC respectively. The police also filed charges under Section 35 of the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA), accusing Zubair of receiving funds from Pakistan and Syria.
A Delhi magisterial court had previously denied bail to Zubair on July 2, finding the nature of the offenses against him, and the initial investigation stage, required him to remain in custody.
Zubair’s advocate, Vrinda Grover, argued the charges against Zubair were vindictive actions to target his fact-checking operations through his news agency Alt News. She also contended that the image in his tweet was from a 1983 movie and had not caused any religious disturbance in the four years since he posted it. Grover also rejected the FCRA charges by stating that Alt News only accepted domestic contributions, which required proof of citizenship and could only be made from an Indian bank account. Therefore, Alt News could not receive funds from foreign residents violating the FCRA.
The Delhi court, while granting bail on Friday, observed that “the voice of dissent is necessary for a healthy democracy” and that mere criticism of any political party did not warrant filing charges under the IPC. The court also noted that no one had made a complaint against the post in four years and that the police had failed to establish the identity of the Twitter user who had found it offensive. The court accepted that Zubair and Alt News had complied with all due diligence requirements under Section 39 of the FCRA and were not violating the law.
Despite being granted bail in this case, Zubair will remain in police custody due to six other First Information Reports (FIR) filed against him by various Uttar Pradesh state police units for other tweets. The Indian Supreme Court has granted interim bail to Zubair in one of these cases, which involves a tweet referring to some Hindu religious leaders as “hatemongers.” The UP police alleged that this tweet intentionally outraged religious feelings.
Zubair’s lawyers have filed a petition before the Supreme Court to quash the remaining FIRs and have also sought bail in these cases.
