Ghaziabad Video: Karnataka HC Issues Notice On Mohammed Zubair's Plea For Transit Bail; No Intention To Arrest, Say UP Police
In the Section 41A notice, UP Police said they were not intending to arrest Mohammed Zubair.
The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday issued notice on a petition filed by Mohammed Zubair, co-founder of fact-checking portal 'AltNews', seeking transit anticipatory bail in an FIR registered by Uttar Pradesh police over tweets on the Ghaziabad incident related to assault on an elderly Muslim man.Zubair's lawyers informed the High Court that after the bail application was filed, the UP Police...
The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday issued notice on a petition filed by Mohammed Zubair, co-founder of fact-checking portal 'AltNews', seeking transit anticipatory bail in an FIR registered by Uttar Pradesh police over tweets on the Ghaziabad incident related to assault on an elderly Muslim man.
Zubair's lawyers informed the High Court that after the bail application was filed, the UP Police had served him notice under Section 41A of the CrPC last night, seeking his presence before the investigating officer on June 28 to record his statement in relation to the FIR. The police stated that they were not intending to arrest Zubair, as the offences mentioned in the FIR are punishable with less than 7 years imprisonment.
Noting that there was no apprehension of arrest at this juncture, a single bench of Justice Mohammed Nawaz issued notice on the bail application. The matter will be next considered on June 29.
Zubair's lawyers also informed the bench that a co-accused, journalist Rana Ayyub, was granted 4-weeks transit anticipatory bail by the Bombay High Court yesterday. The bench has directed the copy of the order in Ayyub's case and also the Section 41A notice served on Zubbair to be produced before it by the next posting date.
Advocates Vrinda Grover, Jagadeesha BN, Urmila Pullat and Soutik Banerjee represented Zubair.
Background
The FIR is registered at Loni Border Police Station, Ghaziabad, for offences punishable under Sections 153 (provoking to cause riots), 153A (promoting enmity between religious groups), 295A (insulting religious beliefs), 505 (statements inducing public mischief) & 120B (punishment of criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.
It named Twitter Inc. & Twitter Communications Pvt. Ltd. as it failed to take down the tweets and allegedly allowed the video to go viral.
The FIR was in the backdrop of an elderly Muslim man's claim in a video that his beard was cut off, and he was forced to chant "Vande Mataram" and "Jai Shri Ram". However, later on, the Uttar Pradesh Police ruled out any "communal angle" and said that Sufi Abdul Samad, the elderly man, was attacked by six men, as they were unhappy over the tabeez (amulets) he had sold them.
The other accused in the FIR are news website The Wire along with Alt news co-founder Mohammed Zubair, Congress politicians Shama Mohamed, Salman Nizami and Maskoor Usmani.
What does the FIR state?
The FIR states that a video of an elderly man was circulated by few people on their social media handles, in which, some mischievous elements could be seen beating up an elderly man named Abdul Samad & they were forcefully cutting his beard and they forced him to chant "Jai Shri Ram" and "Vande Mataram".
Further, the FIR alleges that the accused circulated the video of the incident on their Twitter handles, without checking the authenticity of the video, and that they gave the video a communal angle as they intended to incite communal hatred between the religious communities and wanted to disturb the public order.
The FIR also states that the views expressed while sharing the videos weren't individual opinions, rather they were shared with a clear intention, and the sharing of the video indicates a criminal conspiracy. And they intended to incite communal hatred between the Hindu and Muslim communities.
Apart from this, the FIR alleges that upon a preliminary investigation undertaken by the Ghaziabad police, it was found that the people in the video who were beating the elderly man were known to Abdul Samad and they were doing so because the elderly had allegedly sold them a Tabeez (amulet) and thereafter, claiming that it did not work, as promised by Abdul, they beat him up.
The FIR also states that the Police have arrested three persons related to this case, and they belong to both, Hindu & Muslim communities, and the Ghaziabad Police issued a press statement clarifying all these facts.
However, the FIR further alleges, despite the clarification that it was a personal dispute between the parties and the accused are from Hindu and Muslim communities, the accused persons, continued to incite communal hatred by way of sharing the videos and due to this, the fake news with communal angle spread on a large scale.
The FIR also alleges that the fake news has ignited the feeling of fear in the minds of the people of Uttar Pradesh and the accused person, intentionally spread the fake news and since they have an influential presence on social media, they have a responsibility as well.
Lastly, the FIR states that this is not the first time that they have tried to peddle fake and misleading news on social media and that they all, without verifying the truth of the video, shared the video on their social media handles.