The Bombay High Court on Thursday issued notice to the state government and other petitioners seeking their response to a plea by British doctor and YouTuber Sangram Patil seeking quashing of an FIR against him for alleged objectionable social media posts against BJP leaders. Patil, a British citizen of Indian origin, also stated that the Vigilance Circular (LOC) issued against you by the Mumbai Police was illegal.
A single bench of Justice Ashwin D Bhobe issued notice to the respondents and posted the next hearing on February 4.
Senior advocate Sudeep Pasbola, representing Patil, said the matter was urgent. His client had arrived in India alone from the United Kingdom and was unaware of the FIR registered against him, he added.
Advocate General Milind Sathe of the state government said Patil “appears to be connected to the other position and appears to be uncooperative” with the agency. Sathe stated that a response to the allegation, if any, will be filed within a week, which the court accepted.
Patil’s plea sought directions from the court to quash and quash the FIR registered by Bombay Policy. He also requested a stay of further investigation and protection from coercive action pending hearing of the matter. The petition also sought cancellation of the letter of obligation issued against Patil, which prevented him from traveling to the United Kingdom, along with deletion of the petitioner’s name from the authorities’ database. The petition further sought directions to the respondents not to file a charge sheet against Patil during the pendency of their petition.
Patil in his statement said the FIR “does not allege any incitement to violence, threat to public order or disturbance of public tranquillity.” The statement also said that the FIR “does not specify the set of religious, racial, linguistic or regional groups or castes or communities in which the charge promotes hatred or ill will.”
Patil claimed that the police had “mechanically” registered FIR without any preliminary investigation and without any application of mind, thereby “misusing its powers”.
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The statement also said that “within a few days of registering the FIR, without further investigation the LOC was issued.” The action was “absolutely arbitrary,” the statement said. “There was a malicious act on the part of the police officers who initiated the proposal for issuance of the LOC up to the highest level of the hierarchy who had approved the issuance of the LOC,” he added.
The Mumbai Police detained Patil on January 10 upon his arrival at the Mumbai International Airport. He was subsequently prevented from traveling to the UK on 19 January. On January 21, he recorded his statement with the police.
Patil was prosecuted under Section 353 (2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), which provides for a maximum punishment of three years for publication, circulation of statements, false information and rumors creating feelings of empathy and hatred between communities through electronic media.
The NM Joshi Marg police station in Mumbai registered an FIR based on a complaint by BJP media cell official Nikhil Bhamre, who claimed to have found objectionable content posted on a Facebook page called ‘Shehar Vikas Aghadi’ on December 14 last year, containing misinformation about the BJP and its leaders. Bhamre had claimed that Patil had also published the said post to create misinformation.
