Madras High Court Quashes Detention Of Youtuber Manish Kashyap Under National Security Act In Fake Videos Case

The Madras High Court on Friday quashed the detention order passed against Youtuber Manish Kashyap under the National Security Act for allegedl  circulating fake videos of migrant workers from Bihar being attacked in the State of Tamil Nadu.

The Madurai bench of Justice M Sundar and Justice R Sakthivel dropped the proceedings against Kashyap under the National Security Act but allowed the proceedings under the Information Technology Act to continue. While quashing the detention, the court observed that the authorities had not followed due procedure while detaining Kashyap under the NSA Act. The court thus directed Kashyap to be set at liberty if he was not needed in connection with any other case.

In March this year, a complaint was lodged in connection with a fake video alleging that Migrant workers were being assaulted in Tamil Nadu and that they were not safe in the State. Following this, the Madurai District Cyber Crime Police registered a case for alleged offenses under Sections 153, 153(A), 504, 505(1)(b), 505(1)(c), 505 (2) of IPC and Section 66D of The Information Technology Act, 2000. 

Though Kashyap had moved the Supreme Court to quash the detention order and to club all the FIRs registered against him in Bihar and Tamil Nadu, the bench comprising Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud, Justice PS Narasimha, and Justice JB Pardiwala refused to entertain the pleas and granted him liberty to approach the High Court for such reliefs. When the bench had questioned the need for invoking the NSA against Kashyap, Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the State of Tamil Nadu submitted that Kashyap had over six lakh followers on social media and his videos caused widespread alarm and panic among the migrant labor community.

Following this, Tribhuwan Kumar Tiwari, Kashyap's brother had approached the Madras High Court by filing a habeas corpus petition seeking to quash the detention order. Advocate Niranjan S. Kumar, appearing for Tiwari informed the court that he had been granted default bail under Section 167(2) of CrPC in all the six cases registered against him in the State of Tamil Nadu.

Kumar also submitted that although the grounds of the detention order relied on the remand order in the ground case, neither a copy of the remand order nor the order of extension of remand was furnished to Kashyap. He also argued that the grounds made a mention to a bail in a previous case which was not connected to the present case.

The court was thus inclined to quash the detention order.

Counsel for the Petitioners: Mr.Niranjan S.Kumar Assisted by Mr.R.Vignesh

Counsel for the Respondents: Mr. A.Thiruvadi Kumar Additional Public Prosecutor, Mr.K.Govindarajan Deputy Solicitor General of India

Citation: 2023 LiveLaw (Mad) 347

Case Title: Tribhuwan Kumar Tiwari v The Additional Chief Secretary to Government and Others

Case No: HCP (MD) 1000 of 2023