Madras High Court Grants Interim Bail To Temple Activist, Asks Him To Refrain From Making Objectionable Comments Against Women

While granting interim bail, Justice V Lakshminarayanan asked Narasimham to delete all the offensive messages and refrain from making any vituperative comments against women in any of the social media forums. The court also directed Narasimhan not to commit any similar offences.

Previously, in another case, the High Court had also ordered a two-week 'social media detox' for Narasimhan for his distasteful comments against an industrialist. The court had also imposed a fine on him and commented that protectors of Sanatana Dharma should refrain from using such unsavoury words.

In the present case, Narasimham had made a social media 'cry' stating that he had spent a lot of time and money appearing before the Supreme Court and since the matters were not listed, it was a wasted trip. When the defacto complainant replied to this, Narasimhan used derogatory words. Feeling aggrieved, the defacto complainant made a complaint on December 19, which was registered for offences under Sections 75 and 79 of the BNS 2023 and Section 4 of the Prohibition of Harassment of Women Act 2002, Section 67 of the Information Technology Act 2000. Pursuant to this, he was arrested.

The Registry had initially raised an objection of maintainability since Narasimhan had approached the High Court even before approaching the Principal Judge. To this, his counsel TS Vijayaraghavan argued that as per Section 483 of the BNSS, the jurisdiction of the High Court and the Court of Session was concurrent and hence the petition was maintainable.

Since the Principal Sessions Court was closed for the Christmas Holidays, the judge was inclined to hear the matter noting that the matter concerned life and liberty of an individual.

Vijayaraghavan also argued that Section 75 of the BNS was not attracted in the present case since it required a response which amounted to sexually harassing a person. Further, he pointed out that Section 73 was bailable. He also submitted that the statement was a mere transliteration of the regular usage in Tamil.

The court, on perusing the documents opined that the complaint did not attract the offence under Section 73 of the BNS or Section 4 of the Prohibition of Harassment of Women Act. Since all the other offences were bailable, the court ordered accordingly.

Counsel for the Petitioner: Mr. T. S. Vijayaraghavan

Counsel for the Respondent: Mr. KMD Mugilan Government Advocate (Criminal Side)

Citation: 2024 LiveLaw (Mad) 489

Case Title: Rangarajan Narasimnhan v State of Tamil Nadu

Case No: Crl. O.P.No.32420 of 2024