Allahabad: The Allahabad High Court on Monday (January 6) extended the stay on arrest of Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair till January 16 in a case registered against him for allegedly promoting enmity among religious groups on a complaint by an associate of Yati Narsinghanand over Zubair’s post on social media platform X (formerly Twitter).
The FIR against the Alt News co-founder was registered on a complaint registered by Udita Tyagi, general secretary of Yati Narsinghanand Saraswati Trust, alleging that Zubair shared old video clip of Narsinghanand with the intent to incite violence against him.
Zubair had posted on social media platform X calling Narsinghanand’s speech in which he allegedly made remarks against Prophet Muhammad “derogatory”.
High Court granted Zubair 10 days to file a rejoinder
A bench comprising Justice Siddhartha Verma and Justice Yogendra Kumar Srivastava, while extending the stay on Zubair’s arrest, granted him 10 days to file a rejoinder to the counter filed by the Uttar Pradesh government, Live Law reported.
High Court on December 20 last year stayed Zubair’s arrest in the case
The High Court had earlier on December 20 last year stayed Zubair arrest while hearing a plea filed by him seeking quashing of the First Information Report (FIR) registered against him and protection from arrest, claiming that he had posted a post on social media X to highlight repeated communal remarks and derogatory comments made by Yati Narsinghanand.
Ghaziabad police lodged an FIR under various sections of BNS
The First Information Report (FIR) was registered by the Ghaziabad police last year under sections 196 (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion), 228 (fabricating false evidence), 299 (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings), 356(3) (defamation) and 351(2) (punishment for criminal intimidation) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). The High Court was informed by the police that the section 152 of the BNS for the offence of endangering the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India has been included in the FIR registered against Zubair.
