The Allahabad High Court has dismissed a plea seeking to quash criminal proceedings against a man accused of making an objectionable Facebook post against ‘Nabi Paigamber’ (the Prophet) of the Muslim community, holding that the words used prima facie reflected a deliberate and malicious intention to outrage religious feelings.
Justice Saurabh Srivastava rejected the application filed by Manish Tiwari, observing that no sufficient grounds were made out for invoking the High Court’s inherent powers under Section 528 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS).
The court underlined that the inherent jurisdiction under Section 528 BNSS must be exercised sparingly. It clarified that at the stage of summoning, the High Court is not expected to conduct a “mini-trial” or examine the defence of the accused in detail.
“In the instant case, no sufficient grounds have been made out to invoke the extraordinary jurisdiction of this court under Section 528 BNSS,” the court observed.
In its order dated December 2, the bench further said, “At this stage, it cannot be said that no offence is made out against the applicant. The assertions of false implication raised by the applicant are factual issues that require proper adjudication by the trial court based on evidence.”
According to the prosecution, the applicant was charged under Sections 302 (uttering words, etc. with deliberate intent to wound religious feelings of any person) and 353(2) (publishing or circulating any statement containing false information) of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS). The charges arose from allegations that he had made a Facebook post against the Prophet, which hurt the religious sentiments of members of the Muslim community.
The application before the High Court challenged both the chargesheet and the summoning order passed in July this year.
The accused contended that the magistrate had taken cognisance without applying judicial mind. He maintained that he had never made any comment against the Muslim religion and claimed that the alleged comments were posted by someone close to him using his mobile number.
After examining the material on record, including the specific comment attributed to the applicant, Justice Srivastava found no merit in the submissions made on behalf of the accused. The court held that the issues raised by the applicant involved disputed questions of fact, which could not be decided in proceedings seeking quashing and would have to be examined during trial.
Accordingly, the High Court declined to interfere and allowed the criminal proceedings to continue.
