NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked governments of Assam, UP, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh to respond to a petition filed by JNU student Sharjeel Imam seeking clubbing of all FIRs lodged against him for his alleged divisive and anti-India utterances during anti-CAA protests.
Imam — who was arrested from Jehanabad in Bihar on January 28 — wanted the top court to order probe by a single agency after clubbing of all the FIRs lodged against him in Delhi, Assam, UP, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh. Besides hate speech, he has also been charged with sedition and certain provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.
A Bench headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan — which had earlier asked the Delhi Government to respond to his petition — issued notice to other states where cases have been registered against him after Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said notice to Delhi alone was not enough. Other states also needed to be heard, he added.
Mehta, however, said Delhi Government’s reply was ready and it would be filed by Wednesday.
On behalf of Imam, senior advocate Siddharth Dave cited the court’s recent order in Republic TV Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami’s case in which multiple identical FIRs arising out of the same cause of action were quashed, except the one being probed by the Mumbai Police.
Mehta vehemently opposed it, saying in Goswami’s case all the FIRs were verbatim copies of each other. Imam’s case was not comparable to Goswami’s, he said.
Asking the states to file their response, the Bench posted the matter for further hearing after two weeks.
Imam has contended that five FIRs based on the same speech and same facts had been registered against him in Delhi, Assam, Uttar Pradesh, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh
“There is nothing wrong in police registering FIR. If they come to know about some cognizable offence,” the top court had said on May 1.