Recently, Comedian Munawar Faruqui was arrested on 1st of January by the Madhya Pradesh Police.
His arrest was on the allegation that he made derogatory remarks against the Hindu Gods in his stand-up comedy show.
Alleging the same offence, a complaint was filed by Eklavya Singh Gaur, who is the Chief of Hindutva Organization Hind Rakshak Sangathan.
Faruqui plead for the bail in the Session Court as well as the Madhya Pradesh High Court which was rejected by the both the courts respectively.
The reason for the rejection of bail given by the court was that with regards being has to the material seized and the statements of the Witnesses and that the investigation is in progress, no case is made out for grant of bail.
The High Court further stated that there is availability of prima facie evidence which suggests that Faruqui and the show organizer, Yadav, had intended to outrage religious feelings under the garb of standup comedy.
However, when the parties approached the Supreme Court, the Court granted ad-interim bail to the comedian and also stayed the production warrant of Uttar Pradesh Police against him ina separate case.
The court also issued a notice to the MP government stating that the law laid down by the Supreme Court in its 2014 judgment in Arnesh Kumar v. State of Bihar was not being followed and the procedure provided under Section 41 of the Code of Criminal Procedure was not complied with.
SC also quashed the FIR filed by the Police in the present case.
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