Punjab & Haryana High Court Quashes FIR Filed Against Punjabi Singer Miss Pooja, Others For Allegedly Hurting Religious Sentiments In Music Video

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has quashed the FIR filed against the famous Punjabi singer Miss Pooja, actor Harish Verma and others for allegedly hurting religious sentiments by depicting Yamraj as a drunk husband in her 2018 music video 'Jeeju'.

The FIR under Sections 295-A, 499 and 500 IPC IPC at a Police Station in Rupnagar was filed on the direction of a Magistrate under Section 156(3) CrPC on a lawyer's complaint.

“There was non-adherence of two germane aspects involved in the present cases, to which the Magistrate appears to have been oblivious, first; being that without following the procedure envisaged under Section 154 CrPC, the complainants had embarked on filing applications under Section 156(3) Cr.P.C.,” the bench of Justice Aman Chaudhary said.

Secondly, the same were not even accompanied by a duly sworn affidavit of the complainant, as necessitated, both of these being pre-requisite to be mandatorily and meticulously followed as per the directions laid down in Apex Court’s decision in Lalita Kumari, Sakiri Vasu, Priyanka Srivastava cases, the court said.

The court was hearing petitions seeking quashing of the FIR. It was alleged that the religious sentiments were hurt by the singer and actors in the 2018 music video in which Pooja is depicted beating up her drunk husband, who she imagined to be Yamraj.

Considering the submissions of the parties, the Court observed,

“The reflection of application of mind is conspicuously missing (in the Magistrate’s order to file the FIR) , as evidently the Magistrate had neither assimilated nor verified the truth and veracity of the allegations and merely mentioned that prima facie, an offence was made out, that too without even having watched the questioned song which purportedly had hurt the religious feelings of the complainant, while it is settled that in such an act, there must be a malicious and deliberate attempt to outrage the religious feelings of one class”

The Court referred to Ramjilal Modi v. State of UP wherein the Apex Court held that, “Section 295A does not penalise any and every act of insult to or attempt to insult the religion or the religious beliefs of a class of citizens but it penalises only those acts of insults to or those varieties of attempts to insult the religion or the religious beliefs of a class of citizens, which are perpetrated with the deliberate and malicious intention of outraging the religious feelings of that class.”

"Consequentially, the present petitions stand allowed and the impugned orders as well as the resultant FIRs alongwith the proceedings arising therefrom are set aside," said the court.

Case Title: Pooja @ Gurinder Kaur Kainth and another v. State of Punjab and another

Counsel for petitioners:Advocates K. S. Dadwal for the petitioners In CRM-M-19106-2018.

Advocates Ankur Mittal, Lalit Singla and Kushaldeep Kaur Manchanda for the petitioners in CRM-M-19760 & 20644-2018.

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